Brightwater Reviews

Pros

none, nothing comes to my mind

Cons

-it was a nightmare and I'm still living with a trauma till this day -needed to seek medical help for the bullying, harassment and crazy levels of micromanagement -stuffy and smelly office- a lot of issues with heating and water supplies, on one occasion toilets not working and staff was told to go to Foodie -very clique environment consisting of horrible people -no support, unethical practices consisting of bullying, stealing candidates, extreme micromamagemt, psychological abuse -cult environment where the greed is the god and people are being named and shamed - the positive reviews are written by staff who is being forced to write them, if you want an honest opinion ask former employees on LinkedIn

Pros

professional, pacey, challenging environment where you can learn a lot.

Cons

Micro managing and sometimes clicky. A lot of pressure.

Pros

I have been working at Brightwater for the past 4 years. I have a good few years recruitment experience, having worked in a previous agency and grounded from having previously worked in a sales environment. I'm used to targets and KPI'S When I joined the Brightwater team it was entering a process of new and positive change. I wasn't aware of this when I started but I have seen significant and hugely positive changes since then. I am writing this because a former colleague left a review above that I cannot associate myself with at all. I will preface by saying, I am not the highest biller in the company, I am not a manager and absolutely no one has asked me to write this but I do feel compelled to. I work hard, some months are good for me and some I do not have the success I aspire to. I have never been pulled up on that. I have always felt supported, I have always been encouraged and bolstered to do my best. I am not the loudest voice in the room, I keep my head down and focus. It is worth my while to do so. If ever I am struggling, I am always guided. I have been mentored and supported even when I did not vocalise my own concerns. I cannot fault the management team, led from the top. Barbara, John, Aoife and all the Senior Management team are very mindful of all of us that they know are doing our best and working hard. I know my colleagues feel the same and that is why we are still here, working hard, wholly committed and giving our best. I am disappointed that someone who didn't really work that hard or add to our team and therefore didn't really have much success, purely because of that, would write a review as posted on August 17th. It is entirely unfounded and inaccurate and quite honestly, downright unkind. We are in incredibly difficult times, with no precedence, unchartered waters entirely. We had Brexit and all of that uncertainty and then a Global pandemic. I could not have felt more supported. I also could not have done more to make sure my productivity and work ethic was still at my optimum. For me, you get out what you put in and I wanted to continue to show my support for my employers when they were showing me how much they were supporting me. This is all based on my factual experience. I am actually really disappointed that someone who didn't work or try as hard as the rest of us could be so unkind, untruthful or utterly inaccurate of their assessment of what it is like to work here. I wouldn't swap it for the world. I wish us, all of us that are really Team BW, luck, success and credit in time for our hard work and bravery in really challenging times. There is nowhere else I would feel more supported or rather be.

Cons

None now. Apparently in France currently, adding value.

Pros

- Commission structure / low threshold - Gateway to a career in recruitment / sales - The day you hand in your notice (though not your notice period when management stops speaking to you almost entirely)

Cons

Too many to list them all! - Bullying - there is no qualified internal HR team so you have no real grievance process. - Pressure to lie to candidates and clients - Pressure to commit to fees to bill when you are only at client briefing stage and could thus have no indication of likely success beyond having a crystal ball! - Was once told by a manager that I was very deliberate in the CVs I was sending - “throw more [insert expletive] against the wall, some of it will stick” - Referring to some candidates as "interview fodder" - i.e. they are not good enough and are being sent to interview purely to make other Brightwater candidates look good - Tampering with references taken over the phone. One of the consultants had a candidate who had clearly lied about working somewhere. When they alerted their manager to this they basically called the candidate in and "suggested" a story to them of how the discrepancy had occurred - the fee was more important than integrity When someone leaves the company their reputation is torn to shreds internally on a very personal level MASSIVE turnover - even for recruitment. The phone list I had when I started was almost unrecogniseable when I left just over a year later - on average two people leave per month. I joined this company at the start of my career and was somewhat blissfully unaware of what a truly awful place it was to work - there were absolutely no benefits not even sick pay! The MD was doing interviews in the media about the importance of paid maternity leave whilst the company didn't offer any such benefit to their staff. There wasn't even a lunch room, leaving your options to be go out and pay for lunch or eat at your desk whereby there was a subtle expectation that you would continue to take calls. There was a weird intimidation culture: - you had to read a list of about 15 KPIs in front of the whole company on a Friday, I still do not see the purpose of this (nor have I encountered it elsewhere). -You would be excessively chastised like a naughty child if you were 2 minutes late in the morning or back from lunch. -You would be formally called to room 7 any time you did something to displease management (such as be marginally late, wear a cardigan rather than a blazer or some other minor infraction) -Managers would openly whisper about consultants on the floor -"Feedback" from managers was extremely personal and unprofessional - I know of one consultant whose manager told them they had written "Debbie Downer" in their notes beside their name. -If for some reason you could not attend a company organised social event (out of hours) you were questioned endlessly about it and made to feel like you were calling your commitment and work ethic into question