I worked at Salem Web Network 5 years. Unfortunately, I probably stayed about 3 years too long. Salem is great for somethings – primarily the people and the culture that they once had. They tend to hire people right out of college or very young in their careers (except at the management level). Salem gets young, smart, talented individuals, and pays them far below industry average. Many leave after a year or two to move on to something that pays better. Their motto seems to be, “Pay ‘em low and let ‘em go.”
What kept me there for so long was being told time and time again, “You get more content on the site than anyone on the team. You’re next in line to be promoted.” Unfortunately, I believed in that carrot dangling in front of me and kept at it – always giving 100%. I asked many times, “What can I do to improve and stay on a track to be promoted.” Each time the response from management was, “Nothing. Do everything you are doing now and it will come.” After years of waiting, when a senior position finally did open up, it was not advertised, and another person filled it from another team.
At one point I was offered a new job at Salem but it was to the benefit of the organization, not to me. They needed someone to do exactly what I did on another site. It was made very clear to me that it was not a promotion and pay would be the same. Always interested in learning new skills, I asked, “What will I learn in this position?” I was told I would learn nothing. I pressed, “Could I learn more about SEO? Can I be a part of marketing efforts for the site?” I was told no. Those things would be handled without me. I turned that job down. It was simply offered because as the most senior member of the team, I would require no training to do the job. I was the path of least resistance.
Upper management constantly told us, “More content, more content, more content.” Of course, we were not paid any more for the additional content we were supposed to produce. It was just assumed we could do more with fewer resources. This became especially true when the company went through layoffs in April 2018. My team was cut from 9 to 7 people. The team absorbed those jobs while still being told to do more, more, more. Any outlets for creativity went out the door altogether. They chose quantity over quality which made my confidence in the organization fade completely.
Another major concern are major pay discrepancies same roles in the organization. In my team, I was on the low-to-middle end, but a co-worker with the same position made $6,000 more annually. At one point on the team, there was a $14,000 discrepancy between the highest and lowest paid on the team – all at the same level in the same role. We all had the same education level and experience. But that discrepancy reflected how cheaply Salem was able to get the individual at hire.
I left feeling undervalued and frustrated that when I did respectfully voice my opinion (after being begged by management to share my thoughts), I was called into a meeting where I was chastised by the Vice President. He said that I should not expect to be paid what my skills are worth in the Christian media space.
Finally, I think the best representation of the little value Salem places on employees is this: The security code on the building hasn’t been changed since it was installed 6 years ago, despite people being fired and a mass layoff of 10 people. In November 2018, someone came into the building during the day and stole a co-worker’s wallet. The code still wasn’t changed. I inquired about this with HR in my departure meeting because it is a safety issue and needs to be addressed. It is unclear who in management was supposed to have the master key to be able to reprogram the code, but it was misplaced. That is disgraceful. They were supposedly in the process of having someone in to do this but were getting the runaround from the company. Here’s the deal. This is security issue in today’s day and age. I don’t care if you have to replace the whole door. You get someone in immediately to fix that in order to keep your employees safe. The fact that it STILL hasn’t been changed shows how little Salem actually cares about their people.
TL;DR: If you’re straight out of college and need experience, take the job. But don’t make my mistake and overstay. Get your experience and get out.
