11y
Thank you for your review. I'd like to assert that we are an inbound marketing leader, and we have been since our early partnership with HubSpot in 2009. Your comment about "the emperor has no clothes" implies that we're misleading our employees or lying to them. We're a highly transparent company, I would argue more than most other agencies and certainly more than the average small private business. We're open book and share our financials with our team because we trust them. Everyone on our team understands and knows our business and encouraged to bring issues to the surface. Issue management and resolution hasn't always been great, but together as a team we learn how to improve.
As an innovator we are constantly evolving how we do what we do, and that can be uncomfortable for people who aren't motivated to evolve with the business and our competitive space. I agree with the comment that without direction and support, employees can't build a successful career. One of our shortcomings with our flat org structure and ongoing changes has been the lack of a support system--more senior people who can coach and develop new hires to make good decisions and get positive reinforcement. As we've grown, the tenured people in our company are providing this important role. If someone isn't confident about their capabilities and lacks proper support in their job, I can see how they would misconstrue constructive feedback for improvement as being "blamed and shamed". Had this person been more open with me, I would have tried adapting my communication style to better support them.
The notion that leadership ridicules people behind their back is distasteful. I can only suspect that this individual was overly sensitive to HR issues and in a small office they might feel singled out. HR issues must be handled with consistently and we try our best to handle them with professionalism and tact. If one suspects they're being ridiculed by anyone they should approach me directly about it or it can't be addressed. Since this review, our hiring criteria and hiring process has changed in a way that we look for more experience and aptitude in certain areas to ensure new hires can be successful without heavy training and coaching. Unfortunately it seems that we failed this person by not giving them the support they needed to be successful. I hope this person has developed their career path and found happiness in what they're doing.