9mo
Thanks for taking time to provide a review and give us feedback. I appreciate your being transparent. I want to address a few of your concerns and would love to talk to you directly and try to help work through them.
First, let's address the changes to bonuses. Bonuses have not gone away, end of the year bonuses, which were always discretionary went away. There are still opportunities for spot bonuses that managers can give throughout the year for performance that goes above and beyond. The salary increase that complemented the bonus change, was to offset the impact of it. Base salaries are higher and when you get your salary increase next cycle, it will be based off your higher salary. You referenced a 1 - 2% salary increase (used as the offset), end of the year bonuses were typically not higher than that, so for most, the offset does get them to parity to where the discretionary bonus could have. However, none of this was the reason for the change to the bonus plan, we talked through it at the All Staff meeting. I'm happy to talk through all of this if you reach out to me directly (without any fear of retribution) or we have a video of the meeting that I shared out afterwards. We do our best to cushion our employees while we make changes to benefits as we grow and try to stay competitive.
In regards to anonymous feedback, we actually do have a way to give feedback anonymously. We host, at least twice a year, an anonymous form to accept questions that are answered as part of our All Staff meetings. This is sent out by an employee, who is not part of the corporate team, the form is an anonymous form that is not shared with anyone at corporate or on the leadership team. That employee consolidates the list of questions and sends them to me and the VP of HR. The questions are answered at the All Staff meeting. The next opportunity for this will be ahead of the October All Staff meeting.
In addition, for leadership engagement for remote team members. Our leadership team has been scheduling visits and events across the country near locations where we have team members. Earlier this year, in the spring, our President and CFO, John Mutarelli hosted a dinner in Atlanta for all area team members. Everyone was invited. That was specifically designed for two reasons: 1) for our team members to have a chance to meet each other, and 2) for our remote team members to have time in-person with leadership. I hosted a similar dinner in Houston and we had two of our VPs host one in southern NJ and invited NJ and Philadelphia area employees. We also have an upcoming event on September 21st in Virginia and all remote employees are welcomed to attend, you just have to work with your PM and HR to arrange for your visit. If you have other suggestions on how to engage remote employees more, let us know.
Ultimately, at Dev, as at most companies communication is critical. We cannot try to remedy any issue that an employee is not willing to raise with us. You have a right to not agree with changes and to be unhappy with them. We do try to be thoughtful about all of the changes and polices we put in place. As you know, myself and/or our President and CFO, meet with every new employee as part of orientation. We typically do lunch (except for about 1.5 years during COVID) and we then talk through our approach and strategy at the company. We do that so that employees know who we are and have a path for communication and escalation if needed. I am disappointed that you have not felt comfortable sharing your thoughts internally. We do not blackball employees, in fact, our team does everything in our power to try and address issues. We do have a lot of prime contracts, ~90% of our work is prime work, so depending on skillsets and contract work requirements there could be options to assist with moving up. Part of that is the employees responsibility to communicate with your manager about your professional growth.
Please reach out to myself or Emma, our VP of HR, and we will work through some of this with you. ~Kendall, CEO