Treat Like Dirt - Social Media Account Manager Curtis Gabriel Employee Review

Thanks for taking the time to leave a review, as CEO I’m always open to feedback and are constantly working to make Curtis Gabriel a successful business for our staff and clients. I’d like to address some of the issues you raise in the hope you can see your voice has been heard. As I’m sure I told you when you worked at CG, my door was always open if you had concerns. Clearly pay and working hours are at the core of your review. Establishing and growing an agency has taken CG several years and the commercial reality is that financial constraints are a reality for all businesses. I’m not sure anyone feels they are paid enough, but I can say that we have listened to and are not blind to these concerns. Of course, if we do not pay competitively in the market, we will lose staff and not be able to recruit those that will continue our success. Our current vacancies are mostly specialist positions, showing that we are investing in people who carry enhanced salary expectations. Over the last 12-18 months, across the board our average salaries have increased substantially. Regarding working hours, having been in the business for just over 3 years, I have always committed to ensure staff are not overworked. Agency life is not for everyone. It requires dedication, hard work, commitment and resilience. Those that succeed can go onto to incredible rewarding careers with CG. We have a senior management team who have exclusively worked their way up form entry level positions, they have exciting careers ahead of them. As a business it makes zero sense not to address issues such as work hours. Over the last 12 months we have undertaken staff surveys and had a staff conference where the full results were discussed openly with all staff. Feedback has been listened to and as a consequence, we have recently implemented a total business restructure whereby we have focussed on role specialism, including hiring additional headcount to ensure staff can do a quality job within their contracted hours. Your points around ‘dishonesty’ need addressing. Firstly, we have over 200 clients, if we had ‘promised’ results that weren’t being delivered, they would simply not continue to use our services. Regarding minimum wage, you will have seen my points on salary above. No employee is paid minimum wage at Curtis Gabriel, that is something I am placing on the record. Regarding the industries that Curtis Gabriel specialises in and the fact we have high client retention, your assertion that they are ‘boring’ and social media doesn’t really work for them is a little disparaging to successful businesses. People often join agencies and expect to be allowed free reign over creativity. I’m sure those agencies exist, but they are not the norm. If our work wasn’t impactful for clients, they would simply leave. If they spend money with us, we need to prove ROI that is of benefit to them. Our high client retention rate is due to the incredible work that we do as a team, overall creating barriers to entry and make it challenging for other agencies to displace us. Finally, you are right, we must respect our staff. We are a service business and are nothing without them. Anyone who leaves CG goes with our best wishes, those who stay with us have our commitment that we will invest in them and give them skills and experience that will help them succeed in the long term. This is an iterative process and one we are constantly mindful of. Once again, thank you for your review, I wish you all the best in your future career.