Great People, Weak Structure - Avis employé Manager Method Savvy

Hi there. Jake Finkelstein, Method Savvy's CEO, here. I wanted to take a moment to respond to this review. I truly believe that all feedback is a gift and while I do not know who shared this (nor do I have any intent of making efforts to find out and I want to emphasize publicly that I do not tolerate retaliation for any feedback - constructive or otherwise) I deeply appreciate this individual sharing their thoughts on what Method Savvy does well and where they feel we can improve. I'll echo the comment that our team is filled with nothing but smart, driven and creative marketing professionals who work hard to delight our clients and invest themselves deeply in teamwork. Our team members are what makes Method Savvy great and I will continue to have our leadership invest in career growth and employee engagement. In terms of the constructive feedback, here's what I'll say. 1. I believe that the entirety of our leadership, myself included, takes any concerns raised seriously and are proactive in addressing them. We have multiple reoccurring venues where issues or discussion topics can be raised - regular one-on-ones with managers, a weekly leadership team meeting, a once per month all-hands meeting where we accepted both anonymous and open questions, a dedicated People Success leader who actively seeks feedback from our team and a annual review process. While I cannot claim to know how every one of our team members feels about how leadership addresses concerns, I do deeply believe that all of us at Method Savvy are good people, that we care about each other and want to help each other succeed. 2. Pay is a hot topic, particularly as of late, and I will be the first to admit that historically we have both succeeded and failed in how we have addressed it. Beginning in late 2021 we began to conduct quarterly compensation benchmarks (vs yearly, which was our historical approach) using a subscription tool called Pay Factors that is updated weekly with thousands of new data points. These compensation benchmarks are shared with every manager and are considered (and often shared) with both newly hired candidates and existing team members. Our decisions on compensation are based on areas of expertise, experience level, geographic location and career advancement opportunity. I have no doubt that we can continue to improve in this area as we always seek to offer pay and benefits that are appropriate for our size of business, competitive in the marketplace and reflective of the talents of all our team members. 3. I'm unclear about the "not making efforts to advance with the changing industry landscape" feedback. What I can share is that as an integrated marketing agency we regularly invest in hiring experts in the discipline areas we feel we need to be successful, including having both interdisciplinary teams dedicated to specific sets of clients as well as a shared service team that has deep expertise. 4. In terms of cross-functional collaboration, I have to admit that find this piece of feedback a little confusing because our teams are structured in pods (what we refer to as meta teams) that are engineered to have team members with interdisciplinary skillsets collaborate together. Each team has (at minimum) a director, creatives, a strategist, an analyst, and a consultant/client advisor. The purpose of this structure is to encourage cross-functional collaboration, not discourage it. 5. I agree with the feedback of "don't overload managers with tasks that can be done by other teammates with some education and guidance" Our goal is to have managers spend no more than 50% of their time in-the-work so they can have 50% of their time to focus on leadership, the team's professional development and people management. In the ebb and flow of client work we do not always succeed at this goal - but with continued investments in hiring experience team members, providing continuing education to our existing employees and building out a robust shared services team we are already committed to creating as much space as possible for leaders to lead and for our team members to grow as professionals. All said, I welcome and encourage all Method Savvy team members to share questions, concerns, and needs with your manager, with our People Success leader, during our all-hands meeting and with myself as often as possible. I and all our leadership have a real desire to help and resolve challenges. Only with your engagement and transparent feedback can we do so. Onward and upward. - Jake