Alcoa is a company in transition, still, and though the organization is moving itself in the right direction, it can really be a challenge to constantly work in a state of change and uncertainty.
Frequent shifting in the past few years has lead to the ouster of many tenured employees, leaving some people in positions for which they are not experts. This results in a reduction of much-needed efficiencies.
One downside of the lack of traditional KPI-style performance management is that, at least up to this point, it has been hard for managers to make the case to get rid of poor performers based exclusively on performance.
Diversity is a problem for the organization as a whole.