Pros
ALIVE was once great. It was once a place that had a promising future and I was excited that I got to be a part of it. Honestly, I’m glad it was one of my first “real” jobs. Things are very different now, but years ago when I started, the office had a staff of about 20 people, a handful of freelancers and maybe 10 or so interns. While not everyone was educated, everyone was talented and brought something to the table. It truly felt like bustling small business and we all were pretty much on the same page with where it was going. In my role I was able to interact with major clients and manage big projects on my own—so for my career, ALIVE did provide a tremendous opportunity to learn and grow, for which I am grateful. ALIVE was the right decision for me out of university because I was able to gain a lot of experience in a lot of departments (sales, marketing, events, digital and editorial). I have to say I loved the group of people that were in the office while I was there. Gossip was an issue and, of course, some people just didn’t get along all the time, but I definitely enjoyed coming to work and made friendships that have held up since I left. Let me be clear, the cons outweigh the pros of working for ALIVE. It’s not anything like it once was. Everything has quickly unraveled and the headcount is dismal at this point. I cannot imagine what it would be like to work in that office now.
Cons
I averaged 10 hours days regularly with no overtime. And as such, was not able to learn how to create an acceptable work/life balance. At the time I didn’t see it as an issue because I was young and learning, but now I see that it was incredibly inappropriate to be overworked to the extent I (and almost everyone in the office) was. At first I was constantly telling myself “one more week of long days and I’ll be caught up” but that never happened. I brought many skills to the office and as soon as one was discovered, it was quickly exploited. Real quick regarding the company “leaders:” - One was educated, experienced and very good at what she did. However, she could be rather cold at times and didn’t feel like she had to do “below her” tasks like printing things or making copies. - One was absolutely incompetent and unprepared; constantly not delivering on promises made to clients (putting the account execs in awkward positions having to apologize and sell marketing solutions at a discount or for free as a “make good” all the time), late on pretty much anything asked of her, disrespectful of interns, etc. - The ad sales team had decent leaders, but the account execs were all treated like workhorses out there hawking the garbage ALIVE began selling. - The three partners: one only wanted to take photos, so he was never in the office; one always seemed a little disorganized and hesitant to stand up to the publisher, but he finally left and started his own magazine which is doing great; read any of the recent reviews and you’ll get a good image of the third partner, the publisher. The publisher single-handedly brought down the company with her questionable business practices, lack of ethics or morals and flippant approach to hiring/firing. We were constantly told “it’s gonna get a little worse and then it’ll get better,” which was half true. Things slowly got worse during my time but nothing ever got better. I’m grateful I got out when I did, and genuinely feel bad for the people who bought into the “business plan” and stayed.