Death to BT Fresca, BT Expedite rises out of the flames then crashes and burns!
Pros
20 mins on the fast train from London (to High Wycombe where we are based). Alhtough, just get a job there to overcome the below negatives!
Cons
Where to begin! Let's start with some history... A long time ago, in a galaxy far away (6 years to be precise), Fresca was owned and managed by the previous owners, and life was pretty much hunky dory. Everyone was friends, management respected staff, work progressed well, and the company made a profit. BT saw this and thought that they wanted a piece of the action; and bought out the company. They left the company to continue to make money with the original management. What's wrong with this then? I hear you ask? Just over a year ago, BT decided that they could do things better than the profit making managing directors that had started the company from scratch and grown it into the successful global company that was BT Fresca. Can you see where this is going?! BT push out the old managing directors, then install a new team of senior management. Straight away, they decide to make some waves and announce that we are to merge with our sister company BT Expedite and take on their name. Then the fun starts. Nearly all of BT Fresca's middle management are stripped out and allowed to leave the company taking all the product knowledge with them. They are replaced by the management in BT Expedite who don't know/understand our products. This then causes bad management decisions, which result in staff getting annoyed and leaving (invariably joining the companies where the middle managers went). Customers then get the hump as the level of service drops, and they start leaving. Due to a dwindling customer base and losses measured in the millions, the senior management then decide that they will not be replacing any (or hardly any) of the leaving staff which stretches the existing staff to breaking point and more leave - to the point where we are losing a person from the office on average every 4 days, for a company that only has about 90 staff (down from around 140 a year ago), this is incredible and is making people wonder how much longer the company will be operating for. During this time, the staff have had all of their previous "Fresca" benefits taken away, like the government cycle scheme, beer Fridays, staff socials, etc., etc. with the promise of BT benefits. Surprise surprise, a year later, we haven't had any of the BT benefits! You might be wondering what the senior management team have been doing while all this waste hits the fan?! Wouldn't it have been good if they spent some time on the ground, learning the processes, policies, culture, product, etc. Then trying to improve the dire situation that has arisen? Yes is the answer to that question. However, in practice, the senior management team have been staying as far away as possible. The staff see the senior management once every few weeks, and even then they might come in about 11am in the morning and disappear off home again about 3pm. Nothing like setting a good example!! By stripping out the middle management, staff have effectively been allowed to run riot. The original policies that were in place to ensure a quality product is delivered, are no longer followed, because there are no management to make sure that the extra work is done - hence poor quality code goes out, which in tern increasing support issues, putting an extra burden on the support team that has lost half it's staff in the last year. Some staff have even been able to follow the lead of the senior management team and when they do turn up, they turn up at 11 and go home about 4, then at the end of the month claim a whole week's overtime, which annoys the other staff which can't get away with this blatant cheek! All of this and BT Expedite pay below market rates for their staff, meaning that when looking elsewhere for employment, it's an easy decision to make when people are offering £7k more for lower jobs - who is going to turn down job offers like that. It seems that the senior management have favourites, so some people can do as they please. We had an office manager that refused to answer the phone or the door. I heard the person would divert all the office calls to the support team, that was already overstretched with increased support issues and reduced staff, which further lowered morale. Many staff are questioning the future of the company and BT's intention for it. Are they trying to kill it and sell it off? Are they just lazy and letting it fail? Who knows? All we know is, it's time to jump ship before it's too late! I could spend another few hours highlighting the issues, but you get the point. BT Expedite is now a flawed company with a question hanging over it's future.
