Leadership at every level of the global creative team is highly toxic. There are several individuals in leadership with numerous HR complaints against them, yet no action is taken.
In my short stay at benefit a number of employees confided in me that their therapists have advised them to quit due to the toxic environment. Many employees suffer from low self esteem, and the climate is one of fear. Some employees are scapegoats and others are favorites, with little in between–a textbook abuse dynamic. Verbally attacking employees is normalized, and employees are walking on egg shells 24/7.
Instead of looking for solutions, I have observed a lot of time spent looking for someone to blame. Small, innocuous details of daily life turn into conflict. I spent a lot of my time at Benefit wondering why we were arguing rather than simply completing our work. Unprofessional and hostile environment that quickly escalates minor, non-issues into full blown arguments.
This creative team is not really “creative,” it’s more like a glorified marketing team–none of the leaders have recent experience at creative agencies or leading real creative teams. These so-called creative leaders are really more like marketing people, and have little insight into the process and real labor performed by creative. Practices are out of date, and the mentality is old school overall. Reviews and approvals are completely meaningless, as even when something is approved by the CEOs, at the last minute projects often take drastic conceptual leaps, departing from what had been approved. This causes the team to reconcept over and over again, The people at the top do not have vision and they dont know what they want. Unclear, everchanging, undefined standards have consequences, and in Benefits case, they have had to re-shoot entire campaigns.
Creative resource management is atrocious, forcing creatives to deliver well beyond the scope of their title. For example; project managers editing video, designers shooting tik toks, etc. People are being pushed to take on more and more responsibility with no increase in pay or title. The current creative leader has made it abundantly clear that she does not have a problem with squeezing employees for all that they are worth.
I broke out into stress hives as a result of my short time here, completley lost my appetite, and had several other stress related medical issues. I would avoid this place like the plague, especially if you are interviewing for global campaign and content team. There’s also a documented pattern of scapegoating freelancers, so if you are going in freelance, be super cautious. I have worked at dozens of places and this stands out as the worst experience i have ever had as a creative. Absolutely miserable place to work.
