CBRE has a reverse midas touch whereby everything they touch turns to a certain brown substance. After TUPEing over from Savills, CBREMS managed to single-handedly deconstruct all that worked well for our site.
Operationally, everything was a hindrance rather than a help; processes were unnecessarily convoluted and counter-productive. Instead of focusing on strategy and development we were now wasting our time bogged down in trying to navigate what used to be the simplest of tasks. The role seemed to completely change and was a step backwards in terms of the responsibility previously afforded to me. Autonomy was a no-no and the whole team experienced this - our input into how to run our own site was no longer welcome or encouraged. A big, green bull in a chinashop is how I'd summarise the transition to CBRE.
Financial processes were archaic, our accountant was a liability and the training sessions were nothing short of kafkaesque. The management were neither leaders nor role models - merely sycophantic 'yes' men for the client. Requests for help were met with backbiting and passive-aggressive comments from Operations if you dared to ask the wrong individual. Site visits from operations were spent waiting for the axe to fall for some inconsequential matter. The company values (respect, integrity, service, excellence) read like a piece of authoritarian propaganda that only served to highlight the polar opposite culture that really existed. At training sessions you could spot a TUPE'd employee a mile off with their forlorn, thousand-yard stare.
