The company can be best described as a giant ship with no Captain. This family owned business has grand designs of being the next Apple or Amazon but changes directions frequently, with the release of each new management book or autobiography affording the owner an opportunity to reinvent the company. Token western employees are rotated in and out on an annual basis to satisfy the Caucasian customer and supplier base, none of whom are given the latitude to perform their jobs, while being judged by metrics which could be described as optimistic at best given the company’s finances and complete lack of internal resources. Non-Asian hirings are seemingly done to appease a particular vendor or supplier. At every supervisory position in the company, an untrained family member or distant relative or associate becomes a roadblock. These individuals are put in positions beyond their ability and eye every employee with suspicion, reducing employee morale to the bare minimum. Simple decisions such as where to place a product on a retail shelf are reduced to a civil war as family member squabble over how to best accomplish the task.
The company only continues to exist by discounting and cost cutting, and that extends to the employees as well. Employees are encouraged to take low salary positions, with promises of large bonuses that never come through, allowing the company to force employees to work overtime without compensation. Due to a lack of management experience and savvy by the current owner and his family, the company has switched to a very metric driven model. This would not be a problem if the data driving the metrics was anywhere close to accurate. Stories were commonplace amongst employees where bonuses were not paid out when data was clearly shown not to be accurate. Combined with the cronyism, this lead most of the talented employees to seek employment elsewhere as morale declined.
Treatment of employees was generally poor, with little regard to work life balance. Employees at mid-level salary and above are expected by accessible to the owner 24/7. Employees were commonly told who they could and couldn’t talk to within the company, with security cameras monitoring non-inventory areas such as the offices and workspaces of individuals. Company phones, emails and all other forms of communication were monitored leaving many employees feeling violated. Paternity leave was a particularly contentious issue, and vacation time was encouraged be broken up into periods of days. The company basically has the openly hostile feeling of a tight-knit family business dealing in precious commodities that opens itself up to a first employee with no ties to the family.
Company culture can be best describe as tense, with small cliques commonplace. Non-head office staff were afforded no opportunity for advancement, which forged a wedge between those staff and head office employees. Non-Asian employees were gathered into customer or vendor facing positions, leading to resentment by Asian employees who felt positions were based on ethnicity. Female employees were treated as subservient, and were not given the same latitude as male employees.
