I’ll start. How many people know people who were laid off Th in corporate communications? And how many people know people who were demoted? And how many people know people who were moved into roles with no manager, no job description, no clear responsibilities? We should list them all here since no one in HR or BR are willing to tell us the real deal!!!! I’ve never seen people treated like this in my entire life. Public Affairs is the perfect example of the old toxic culture that existed at Wells Fargo that it is supposedly trying to “restore and protect”...
53 replies (most recent on top)
'Disaster' is a pretty good description. Completely random choices. Good people sent away with mediocre people being kept. No reasons given for the choices being made. New leaders not named. Managers demoted with pay taken away; how's their motivation now? (Maybe HR is hoping they'll leave without paying severance.) Everyone is mentally checked out, the good ones still here that I've talked to are already looking for new jobs. HR botched this big-time and BR is a figurehead looking for a quick payday before scuttling back to Ketchum/Omnicom, where she'll probably be a year from now with WF as a client.
Say what you will, but Corp Comm has and always will be one of the easiest and expeditious areas to farm out if needed to do so in a crunch. I doubt anyone looks back and regrets their decision to slam on Corp Comm people.
Sounds like Corp Comms is down at least 30% this year alone. That’s a lot of battle-tested talent out the door.
Yes, it’s been a tough few years for Corp Comm. And yet - it appears upper management decided at some point that the best thing to do was nothing. Communicate only on a needs to know basis - and the average employee needs to know nothing.
And that philosophy continues to this day.
Placate the public with a few well publicized charitable donations, collect canned goods at the branches at the holidays, and pretend the scandals never happened. Done and done.
I had to look up the official description of what Corporate Communications Departments do. It is:
“Corporate communication is a set of activities involved in managing and orchestrating all internal and external communications aimed at creating favourable point of view among stakeholders on which the company depends.”
Interesting, right? How would you like to work for, or manage, a department who’s responsibility is to put a positive spin on all the activities of a smoke and mirrors organization like Wells Fargo? It would be one big lie after the next. Convince employees that our senior execs aren’t painting a target on their backs, convincing customers that the investment recommendation isn’t due to new sales goals, convincing shareholders that selling off businesses and laying off employees should be enough to save this aging dinosaur. I mean no criticism to the employees of Corp Comm. My aim is Wells Fargo itself. I would want to work for a corporation where I didn’t have to work so hard to find something to put a positive spin on.
How does BR oversee marketing when she couldn’t sell a dog a bone?
Who the heck is “BR”?
What would you expect with Schart and Daley (or anything from Chicago)?
@bbi+1aYCVd00 Because they want to have something to whine about and no one wants to hire them
why do people work in this company?
Total impact in communications alone was at least 45. Dozens in the LOB teams. Many within Stories team. Entire PA team pulled apart or laid off. Three senior leaders - who I have personally witnessed saving BR from total embarrassment - shown the door. This is on top of what went down earlier in the year. Who knows how many people were demoted. The idea of interviewing for a job for which you have no job description makes it kind of hard… If not, you resign? This is WFC under BD.
And yet, there were comms people laid off who were here much longer than BR’s directs. How about this? There were people laid off yesterday who were not given an opp to apply for other open roles. And still others who were told their job was eliminated but they could apply to a COE role — but they would be just at the starting point of interviews. Still others have previously been told this and they are mid-cycle in the interview process. Managers demoted with pay cuts. No managers of COEs announced. What’s the over-under that BR will still be employed here in three months?
full tally is not known broadly but it was significant.
Long flowery email announcing displacement of two of BR directs - as she sticks the kn--e in them.