I was extremely excited to join Lotame because of the history of the company and how long they have been in existence, in addition to the fact that I was excited about working at a DMP but I quickly realized I had made a terrible decision in taking the job and it was probably one of the worst environments I have worked in within 10 years. This feedback is mostly in relation to the Client Success team experience but to be honest, the entire company has a complete lack of organization, down to HR and how they handle sensitive manners. It seems like no one has any idea of what's truly going on across the company.
The Client Success processes are all over the place; everyone does everything differently and not in a good way. When you're asking the team questions, you will get different answers from different people and they aren't all necessarily correct. There is no collaboration between the client services team members - some of them won't even say hi back to you if you greet them when you walk into the office in the morning and everyone is only worried about themselves. When transitioning accounts from people and asking questions to learn the business, instead of having a conversation or debrief, I was told to "Go look at Salesforce and figure it out" even though the answer may have been more complicated or it would be a helpful discussion. Some team members spoke to others in a very condescending way which is unnecessary in the workplace and unprofessional.
There is a big disconnect between the Client Success Managers and Sales reps - specifically where new processes would be rolled out without alignment and it would come to a head in front of clients. There were no re-occurring cross-team Sales and Client Success meetings and no weekly meetings just between CSMs to catch-up and share out what's happening with their accounts or to discuss any kind of development plans or ways to improve. I have been fortunate to work at companies in the past where the work environment is fun because it feels like you're with friends and while you don't have to be best friends with the people you work with at every job, there is a sense of humanity that comes with spending 8 hours/day, 5 days/week with people and that is just lacking at Lotame within this team.
Managers are not promoted based on merit or qualifications, rather than how long they have been at the company or who they are friends with and are not interested in personal or professional development - its a very tactical "check the box" approach rather than encouraging strategic thinking and development or trying to improve processes and how to work with clients. Titles are made up and all over the place and don't follow any sort of system and there are people in senior management who don't even know how to do the job of the team they are running and quite frankly, don't really do anything useful. Since many people have been at the company for so long, they have a very small-minded or old school way of thinking and don't really have much experience across the industry to be able to advise intelligently.
From an overall company perspective, there are NO reviews and the culture doesn't allow for open communication or honest feedback...there's a lot of passive aggressive behavior and commenting. There is a serious lack of formal training from a company and team perspective and I was given very basic "goals" that are not a helpful gauge of how you are performing amongst the team. The actual offices lack organization and are pretty messy and not run very well - especially in Maryland and in NYC, there was an employee that was CONSTANTLY vaping IN the office which is in fact ILLEGAL (gross). Yes there are snacks and some beverages available but it feels thrown together and not very organized. Company lunches, outings and events are far and few between and not very creative or enticing.
My interview process was very short and contained and in reality, it probably should have been a red flag. The bonus structure was very loose and based on the team, not individual performance which works out well for those who have rough quarters or are performing at status quo but not for those who constantly excel and exceeding goals. Normally for Account Management / Client Services positions, you get to meet with people in other departments that you are working with such as ad ops, sales, technical AMs and I should have done more due diligence in asking to speak with more people prior to accepting the position.