Stay away... - Coordinator Collette Employee Review

Collette is not a place I look back on with fond memories for several reasons: First off, they tout Collette as a place with a fantastic culture and amazing benefits, when really they are sub-par and not worth raving about at all. I suppose if you have been there for 10+ years and are in the right job or with the right department, your experience may be better. But there are plenty of other companies with benefits out there that are actually worth raving about. Hourly employees get 10 PTO days a year (5 more at 5 years, 10 at 10 years, etc.) Salaried get 15 PTO days. 3 personal days & 2 (2!) sick days. Not sure how you can be a travel company and offer such average vacation days… They give you opportunities to travel, which SEEMS like a good perk, but in reality is an opportunity shrouded in red tape… I think many employees hope to see the world in their roles, but the reality is many don’t. The lottery system is based on seniority so unless you have been there a long time, you won’t get chosen. I was also told they look at how much you’ve traveled when considering you for an opportunity…not sure what that has to do with picking someone for an opportunity, but whatever. They do give you 10 FAM days (after your first year though) to use on a tour with them. However, you do have to pay for these tours (you get a discount) and you’re on a tour with people in their 50s, 60s plus. I’d rather have that time to travel on my own, not pay for their tours and give them money. And not many tours are under 10 days to go on, and the price is capped so that also limits your tour selection too. Pay is pathetically low. The department I was in was laughably low for the work load. I thought maybe it just depends on the department, but I heard it was this way in many departments - high work load, with very low pay. You’d think you could combat that with OT pay…but your OT is capped at 3 hour per week. Hate your department and want to move to another? Well…you have to wait 18 months to apply for an internal transfer. I may have stayed longer had I been able to move to another dept. But this rule is ridiculous. You’re stuck in a position you may hate for this reason alone. My department and the work itself was the ultimate reason for my negative experience. Initially my job was pretty straightforward, as I was temping. Then it turned into a permanent role. With transitioning to a permanent role, my job totally changed (even though I was told the permeant role would be the same work) and I hadn’t discovered why until months later. With this transition, it was immediately apparent my work load was an ever-growing mountain of work, never to be totally tackled, no matter what I did. I came in early, left late and brought up several times to my manager how impossible the work load was. I tried to be more organized, and asked other employees for tips on how they tackled the job. Nothing worked. I thought it was me, until I discovered other employees in the department felt exactly as I did - overwhelmed daily with the workload. One said to me ‘I come in to work every day and try not to cry.’ Other employees before me only lasted a year. So much of the job was tedious and time consuming and could have been helped by even bringing in interns or part time workers to help, and this was brought up my other employees too, but they never did. I felt like I voiced my concerns to my manager and was just plain ignored and not listened to. To them, it was always MY fault, or something I didn’t do - rather than THEIR fault or THEM having too high of a workload or THEM expecting too much from employees. I knew in my training for this job that it would be a huge workload and I worried about handling it - and I wish I would have listened to my instinct on this and passed on the opportunity. And my random, out-of-nowhere job change? Turns out it was another employee who asked to take over what was supposed to be MY permanent job, and have me take over their job - the stressful, huge work load one, because they could not handle it anymore! And they were previously in a management role, and kept their same salary as a manager, even though they were no longer in a manager position, and we did the same job - which I was paid entry-level salary for…with a whopping .38 cent raise when I took the permanent role. With the turnover rate, employees requesting to move roles and ones in the role so overwhelmed, I should have seen those as major red flags to jump ship now, but I didn’t. I stayed, knowing those were bad signs, and my mental health suffered greatly because of it. I’ve since found a job I enjoy much more where I can contribute ideas and feel listened to. Oh and I actually get time off to see the world (something that I’d have to stay at Collette 25 years for to be able to do). I surely would have been let go with the Covid-19 pandemic, as everyone I knew there was as well. For a company that is debt-free (allegedly) and touts how much they care about their employees, they sure let go so many of them the second they could… Lastly, the parking is a NIGHTMARE. Way too much people there and not nearly enough parking. They gave away a parking space in one of their holiday parties as an incentive to enter because parking is SO bad. In summary, I side-eye the more positive reviews of working here and urge you to listen to the more negative ones. Maybe your experience will be better in the right role…maybe. If you’re fortunate enough to get the right opportunity. Otherwise? There are better companies out there.