Mismanaged Leadership, Burnout Culture, and Dysfunctional Processes - Account Manager Power Digital Marketing Employee Review

Senior leadership (VPS and above) are almost entirely unqualified for their roles. Most have never worked anywhere else and were promoted simply for being “OGs”—employees who happened to join early. These are people who were email marketing strategists or SEO analysts just a few years ago, now making critical decisions that they have zero experience to handle. The result is chaotic, illogical, and demoralizing for anyone below them. Middle management is the only saving grace, they genuinely care about employees and client success, but their hands are tied at every turn by inexperienced leadership. This creates constant bottlenecks, leaving employees overworked and unsupported. Strategists are assigned far too many accounts, client churn continues to rise, and yet the company refuses to hire more staff. The response to high churn and burnout? Lay off employees in January 2025, then increase workloads for remaining strategists. Absolutely insane. Any financial models that justify this are completely detached from reality, they assume humans can work at 200% capacity indefinitely. The sales process is another disaster. Clients are routinely mis-sold with unrealistic expectations, or are completely incapable of using the services we provide. Somehow, these clients make it through the sales cycle without any basic checks, leaving account teams to deal with immediate frustration and failure. Mis-staffing on brand new accounts is rampant, creating further burnout: huge clients with one strategist, tiny clients with a full team. Cost-cutting initiatives, like relying on hiring overseas staff, have only made things worse. While these employees are talented, language barriers and insufficient support make collaboration really difficult. They are good, talented people who are set up to fail. The agency claims to be “people first,” but that only applies to OG employees and executives. Middle managers work tirelessly to protect their teams, only to be overruled by inexperienced leaders who have zero credibility or real-world experience. This is a toxic environment where burnout is guaranteed, client satisfaction plummets, and any sense of professionalism is sacrificed for short-term “efficiency.”