If you carefully scroll through reviews, you'll notice a bulk amount of 4-5 star reviews around a certain period of time within the past year. While some may be genuine, several are manufactured as there was an internal initiative soliciting associates to submit high-rated reviews in effort to position Advisor Group as a Best Place to Work. So please, read with a grain of salt. Also, my experience is common for the department I was in; this is not representative of all teams at Advisor Group. I'm not a disgruntled employee by any means; it's hard to know what a place is really like before going there. Had I known any of these things, I would not have accepted the offer to work here.
Now for cons. These are things I experienced first and second hand:
- Extreme neptism: I've never seen anything like it in the +15 years I've worked
- Rampant sexual harassment: I was regularly sexually harassed at EVERY Advisor Group sponsored conference I attended. The most frequent experiences being sexual advances, being followed to my hotel room on multiple occasions, hands being placed on my waist, etc. When I reported this to my managers, the response I was given every time was I get paid the salary I do to deal with that as it comes with the territory of working with advisors along with the recommendation to purchase a fake wedding ring or find a man to bring with me.
- Direct reports being fired without their manager knowing
- Bullying at all levels (and a lot of it) and retaliation without repercussion despite being reported
- Being in constant spin mode because of leadership's inability to make a decision or set priorities that match overall strategic initiatives but rather jumping at shiny objects without an actual plan or making constant last minute changes
- Leadership constantly getting in the weeds despite associates having a track record of measurable, quantifiable success (a severe lack of trust)
- Leadership refusing to trust their teams with things as minute as an email to advisors without running it by advisors first for their opinion (without advisors having any background on the strategy or context..again, no trust in associates)
- Managers making last minute changes to things without the person responsible for delivering it knowing. If you ask for context simply to learn, you're viewed as being defensive and combative (basically, never ask for context just be an order taker as that's the best way to succeed).
- Confusing marketing with practice management (and a lot of people who say they're "marketers" with no actual marketing experience)
- Advisors being allowed to speak to home office associates however they please: this was unlike anything I've ever experienced. During my time there, I (and several others I worked with) were regularly subjected to name calling, verbal and written threats, literal yelling akin to temper tantrums, harassing phone calls and emails, etc. all for not answering an email fast enough or missing a phone call (we support over 7,000 advisors and their teams for context and my role was not customer service/call center). This behavior is accepted and enabled as anytime this was reported to managers on up, the advisor was catered to and coddled especially if they were a top producer.
- No systems talk to each other and are incredibly behind technologically which cripples if not outright halts ability to work effectively, efficiently, and collaboratively.
- Little to no room for growth unless you: Are a friend/family member of someone on the leadership team, come from a competitor, and/or are comfortable with sacrificing integrity and honesty in favor of personal gain. I can't count how many times I witnessed associates starting rumors about their managers or team members just to get promoted...which worked.
- No onboarding: If you don't come from this industry, you WILL have an uphill battle with learning in spite of any transferable skills. Yes, that comes with almost every job but the difference is whether or not the support internally is there.
- Open favoritism which directly impacts an associates quality of life in the office and ability to be promoted or learn new skills for professional development. This trickled into salaries as well. There are several instances where new associates started in inexplicably high pay grades with higher titles than people on the team who had the exact same job with significantly more experience all because they were friends of the hiring manager or boss of the hiring manager.
- Open floorplan: With the number of people on the phone most of the day, this format makes it very hard to focus and be productive especially for associates who are leading webinars and constantly had to ask those around them to be quiet.
- A strong narrative of "this isn't my job" and "that's how we've always done it"; very little accountability.
