This is a great place to work if you’re local, want to stay local and don’t realize what an actual healthy culture is. There are too many bitter lifers here that remain in a silo and have poor, uncollaborative attitudes. Let’s also discuss the rampant nepotism and promotion of family members that are poorly equipped to manage people or even relate to the workforce. We had a family member place an IG story about going to a Walmart for the first time, in her 30s…way to spread the elitism but hey, we’re “one team”, no?
Collette is trying to be everything to everyone and has no real grasp on who their customers are. This was evident in the constant moving of the goal post as they could never stick to a plan or a goal. And being family run, decisions were nearly always made without data or research. Outside leadership brought in to advance the business we’re often disregarded with the notion that you’re not one of us and only Collette people know Collette. Why hire outside talent if you’re not going to listen to them!? Furthermore, benchmarks were often set with no roadmap on how to obtain a goal, making it very easy to keep up with exercises in finger pointing.
During Covid, something like 80% of staff were let go and the rest of us had to wear an inhuman amount of hats. We were told the family didn’t take paychecks, which was a strategic way of saying “don’t whine about your personal struggles” to the employee base. We were furloughed twice and pressured by ownership to work illegally during these times, took a reduction in pay for over a year, 401(k) contributions ceased, had more work due to lean staffing and we were essentially asked to be round the clock available. I was getting calls to my cell phone for invoices not being paid, contacted for on tour issues (who the hell operates during a pandemic without a solid plan or enough staff to execute it) and when I left, I was shocked to learn that they’re company policy is to not pay accrued vacation. I’m not even sure how that’s legal. So yes, it’s family run and they’ll treat you like it’s the family from Succession. Their employees are so talented but they’re burnt out, morale is incredibly low and they’ll hemorrhage more people if leadership continues to blatantly act as if the problems don’t exist.