Was good a couple of years ago but gone terrible - Senior Software Engineer Bede Gaming Employee Review

Hi, Thanks for the feedback on some of the recent changes. Whilst I think our hybrid approach remains very light touch and flexible, and we’ve had positive feedback from a number of employees across the business, I appreciate they don’t work perfectly for everyone and I’m sorry to see it’s not a setup you’re keen on. We’ve always operated some form of informal hybrid working with our offices open for those who could travel in. Some functions were keener than others to have their employees in regularly, some were fine with a predominantly remote setup, but it was pretty ad hoc. We continue to prioritise team feedback in our decisions, and becoming a bit more structured around hybrid working was decided partly on the back of employee feedback gathered through our engagement survey. There was an ask for more clarity on this setup, which had been pretty hazy since the pandemic. We spent several months working with leaders across the business to try and structure something that worked well for Bede and made sure to announce the decision with a 3 month lead time so people had time to adjust. There will continue to be flexibility to manage around your personal circumstances, and the days in office will be mostly manager-led, rather than centrally enforced. As I invited everybody to do when this was announced, I’d be happy to discuss further and I’d encourage you to give it a go for a few months when this kicks in to see how this works for you, or have a chat with your manager if there are any concerns you have around coming into the office a couple of days a week. We always try our best to maintain a great environment for everyone at Bede. We’ve all just returned from our 3 additional Bede days off over Christmas to allow people time to refresh and we continue to offer a competitive benefits package across all locations (8% pension match, private healthcare, etc) as well as decent perks such as snacks in the office, social budgets, regular food trucks and Dominos deliveries. Everyone also received a £300 Christmas voucher as a thank you for their efforts in 2023. I’m not really sure what you mean by wage reductions, as we’ve had our annual salary review process in December which led to a wage increase across the organisation (the 3rd year in a row). Additionally in December 2022 we made a one-off winter payment to the majority of our team to support with the inflationary living cost increases that people were facing. If there is anything more we can be doing on this side I’d encourage you to reach out to the People team this quarter as we’ll be assessing our benefits looking towards a remuneration strategy update later this year. Thanks, David Head of People