SCW is very much a sink or swim environment. SCW hires employees who are incredibly green to the industry, which is great for an opportunity to get into this field. However, SCW does not offer much, beyond a veteran rep giving you some pointers, in the way of training. It was like this from the time I was hired until my departure from SCW, even though they had discussed upgrading their training multiple times. If you do not learn how to perform, you will not survive at SCW. I have personally witnessed people being let go for not performing within two weeks of being hired. While SCW is incredibly skin or swim, there is a high likelihood you will not get an immediate task to perform, outside of the training and making cold calls, for probably one to two months. SCW has a massive communication problem amongst the leadership and employees. Most of the management have a tendency to assume, or take the word of people who are not involved as fact, and never speak to or ask questions of you about the situation. There were multiple instances where senior sales leadership were upset with employees who had a reasonable explanation with merit of their actions, such as quoting at a lower price than normal to regain business, that fell on deaf ears because the leader had already made up their mind or punished the employee. Likewise, the owner and management, if upset with other employees, have given that person the cold shoulder or brought their complaints to another party to make its way to that person instead of just talking to them. SCW is very consistent with a hostile work environment. So much so, when the open door screaming matches between the owner and management team would take place, it was a running joke to say that “Mom and Dad are fighting again.” Personal appearances, for both male and female employees are noticed, taken note of, and commented on. There were multiple times when it was conveyed in an inappropriate way, such as mentioning a female new hire was “perky,” or even asking if someone was “hot and bothered” because they stretched. The comments do not stop at physical appearance, degrading remarks about people's family members have also been made. Open threats to jobs and disrespectful comments about employees, both current and previous, can be overheard from the owner and management team. Additionally, inclusivity is not a thing at SCW. People who were using pronouns in their email signatures were politely asked to remove them through a company wide email. Company policies, such as dress code, are put in place to target individuals rather than communicating to the targeted employee directly. There is also a vast amount of favoritism within the company in regards to remote work, vacation approvals, and travel for work. If you walk into a manager's office, they will likely have to pause “Stranger Things” or whatever else they may be watching. The sales team, beyond a few favorites, are not allowed to remote work. The camera system is actively monitored and there are frequent walkabouts by the owner or management like vultures looking for something to be wrong. It’s frequently equated to a “prison camp” amongst the team. Even if that was okay, your territory will most likely be shuffled so frequently that you can never build traction to create a successful sales career. There are only two employees that have had consistent territory for the length of time I was there, and they are the successful sales team members. When on the bad side of the owner, he has two tendencies based upon your gender: One, you will be given the cold shoulder or excluded if he is upset with you and you are a male. Two, you will be screamed at, belittled, and criticized beyond reason, if he is upset with you and you are female. There were multiple times when I walked in on my female coworkers in tears because of the horrendous way he treated them, yet males never receive the same. Now keep in mind, you can find yourself on his bad side without warning just because you weren’t as excited as he was for something, or even something you weren’t involved in or had zero control over. Speaking of the owner, it needs to be said that a large majority of the issues at SCW are a trickle down from the head. I was personally in meetings several times a week where the direction the company was taking could change on a whim from one hour to the next. And there are multiple meetings like this with multiple teams of management, and the direction of a team that is not even present can change without their knowledge. And the change of direction was typically never communicated to those not present, thus causing mass shifts in focus, wasted time, wasted effort, and pressure to the chain of leadership to get the team performing to the whim of the owner rather than what is successful and profitable. The owner claims that he surrounds himself with people who are smarter than him to build the best team, though his own cloud of arrogance stops him from listening to those around him. SCW recently took on a large partnership with a racing organization. This was the idea of the owner, it was brought to the executives and the overwhelming majority said it was a bad idea. The owner didn’t listen. When explaining the social media impressions for the announcement of this partnership and trying to temper the owners expectations, “Dad can be right sometimes,” was screamed at the room by the owner. The owner is also very vocal about his own personal beliefs and political ideologies. With the recent partnership, there had to be a vast amount of coaching to remove the phrase “Red America” from his vocabulary when speaking about his vision and thoughts of our customer base to vendors and media. In a similar vendor conversation, with a vendor who is headquartered in Chicago and proud of it, “I really just hope the rest of the country just paves over the whole state of Illinois.” Another great quote, “Technology has no place in education. I believe all you need is a chalkboard, and a nun with a ruler,” though keep in mind SCW is a technology reseller with a large portion of the customer base being education entities so the owner of the company doesn’t believe in the product he sells to his customers. If you go against the beliefs of the owner, attempt to temper expectations, or genuinely try to make a positive impact at the company, you will find yourself on the bad side of the owner. The problem with being on the bad side of the owner, beyond the emotional and psychological abuse you will take, is that the owner wholeheartedly believes that every single person is replaceable. It doesn’t matter your tenure, the book of business you built, the relationships you fostered, or the responsibilities you carry for the company that he doesn’t know, you will most likely be replaced, or your responsibilities distributed to already overworked employees.
