Where to begin. Over the course of the last 15-20 years, the company has grown exponentially. As a result, the existing systems, technology and culture have lagged far behind industry standards. While technology can be upgraded, culture can be harder to improve. Prior to COVID, while under the previous CEO, Tom Lawson, HR had put policies into place in an effort to improve work life balance, office culture and flexibility. This included a compressed work week, parental leave, flexible work arrangements, relaxed office attire and a work from home policy, to name a few. The work from home policy went into effect on March 1st, 2020. Employees were given the ability to work remotely up to two days a week. To the surprise of everyone, a little over two weeks later, the entire company was working remotely, full time. This major shift caused the company to rapidly improve and upgrade their existing technology, and it also showed the company that we could be successful while working in a new remote/hybrid work era - or so we thought. At the end of 2021, the CEO stepped down and a new CEO was appointed, Malcolm Roberts. Malcolm's first communication to the company as CEO was to announce that anyone who wasn't vaccinated for COVID-19 was to be fired at the end of 2021. Politics aside, that's an interesting way to introduce yourself, and was the first of many red flags. Over the next 2 1/2 years Malcolm took his used car salesman pitch across the globe! He announced that FM Global would be building all sorts of new state of the art facilities in various countries, while also pretending that he was a proponent of remote work. Employees were told time and time again that remote work was here to stay even after FM Global mandated a 3 day in office hybrid policy. But as all this was going on, rumors were swirling that the big bad Malcolm Roberts wasn't happy that on occasion he had to use a computer to communicate with people. And the people that actually work within the company started hearing that he was planning to force employees back into the new offices he was building. Animosity grew. Then, at the beginning of October 2023, FM Global announced a return to office policy starting on November 6th, 2023. The animosity turned to anger, resentment, distrust, confusion and most concerning, apathy. FM Global had arguably their 3 most successful years in company history while the majority of the company was working in a hybrid role. Instead of looking at that success and building off of it, Malcolm opted to destroy morale and effectively eliminate the trust of his entire employee base. So if you're considering working at FM you should probably just apply to Zurich unless you're in the market to buy a 1996 Dodge Neon.
