4 ms·

I work in a large and friendly company, in which there seems to be a general fear of speaking up. if a company as employee-friendly as mine has difficulty in mo

by mft_ 7y ago

I work in a large and friendly company, in which there seems to be a general fear of speaking up. if a company as employee-friendly as mine has difficulty in moving people towards an open speak-up culture, I think it’s totally reasonable to assume that many companies aren't successful at this, either. It should therefore be reasonable for an Amazon warehouse employee to point out the counter-case for their experience, without you ascribing negatives to Amazon itself based on this.

greedo 7y ago
My company has a quarterly "engagement" survey. If our supervisor doesn't get a 5 rating (highest) from us, he gets in trouble, so as shit rolls downhill, we get in trouble. The majority of the team answers the survey questions dishonestly, so as to avoid rolling shit. The others feel it's their only way of expressing discontent short of leaving.
- laughinghan 7y ago
  Wow, that's terrible. What exactly happens to the supervisor, and what exactly does he do to all of you? What do you think could be done to make this situation better? I wonder if something different, maybe more serious needs to happen to the supervisor for getting a low rating? Or I guess the issue is, he gets to retaliate for a whole quarter and your opportunity to ding him further won't be until 3 months later. Maybe there needs to be an avenue for immediately reporting this kind of retaliation, with clear consequences for him? If the higher-ups don't have the kind of trust it would take to create such an avenue, I dunno what can be done. I guess that's what unions are supposed to be for, but the situation already sounds so broken. I guess if a union already existed and was trusted, it could serve as such an avenue of last-resort.
  - greedo 7y ago
    Well he doesn't really get a low rating. The questions (coming from Gallup I assume) are vague enough that if you answer fairly at all, no one would get a 5 across the board. He gets roughly 4.5 on average, but they compare each category to previous surveys. He doesn't really punish/retaliate so much as make us have a team meeting where we discuss the survey, and then we have to come up with solutions. The surveys are supposed to be anonymous, but who really knows. So the meetings end up with people being vague and non-committal since it's hard to directly criticize your supervisor face to face sometimes. And each supervisor is compared to their peers, and the organization is also rated. So if people don't feel happy about the workplace 100%, mgmt feels like it's the supervisors fault, not upper mgmt. Just a bad situation all around.
    - laughinghan 7y ago
      Dang. I wonder if either there could be an anonymous feedback channel to the supervisor, or a meeting could be arranged (with the supervisor's knowledge, so they don't feel like it's behind their back) that specifically excludes the supervisor where people could discuss what changes they would like, including to the supervisor's behavior, that would conclude with the group agreeing on someone to explain to the supervisor what changes they collectively want.

by mft_ 7y ago

greedo 7y ago

My company has a quarterly "engagement" survey. If our supervisor doesn't get a 5 rating (highest) from us, he gets in trouble, so as shit rolls downhill, we get in trouble. The majority of the team answers the survey questions dishonestly, so as to avoid rolling shit. The others feel it's their only way of expressing discontent short of leaving.

laughinghan 7y ago
Wow, that's terrible. What exactly happens to the supervisor, and what exactly does he do to all of you? What do you think could be done to make this situation better? I wonder if something different, maybe more serious needs to happen to the supervisor for getting a low rating? Or I guess the issue is, he gets to retaliate for a whole quarter and your opportunity to ding him further won't be until 3 months later. Maybe there needs to be an avenue for immediately reporting this kind of retaliation, with clear consequences for him? If the higher-ups don't have the kind of trust it would take to create such an avenue, I dunno what can be done. I guess that's what unions are supposed to be for, but the situation already sounds so broken. I guess if a union already existed and was trusted, it could serve as such an avenue of last-resort.
- greedo 7y ago
  Well he doesn't really get a low rating. The questions (coming from Gallup I assume) are vague enough that if you answer fairly at all, no one would get a 5 across the board. He gets roughly 4.5 on average, but they compare each category to previous surveys. He doesn't really punish/retaliate so much as make us have a team meeting where we discuss the survey, and then we have to come up with solutions. The surveys are supposed to be anonymous, but who really knows. So the meetings end up with people being vague and non-committal since it's hard to directly criticize your supervisor face to face sometimes. And each supervisor is compared to their peers, and the organization is also rated. So if people don't feel happy about the workplace 100%, mgmt feels like it's the supervisors fault, not upper mgmt. Just a bad situation all around.
  - laughinghan 7y ago
    Dang. I wonder if either there could be an anonymous feedback channel to the supervisor, or a meeting could be arranged (with the supervisor's knowledge, so they don't feel like it's behind their back) that specifically excludes the supervisor where people could discuss what changes they would like, including to the supervisor's behavior, that would conclude with the group agreeing on someone to explain to the supervisor what changes they collectively want.