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      Future

      Engaged Employer

      Future reviews

      3.2

      44% would recommend to a friend

      (714 total reviews)

      Kevin Li Ying

      60% approve of CEO

      36% positive business outlook

      Ratings by category

      3.6

      Diversity & inclusion

      3.3

      Work/Life balance

      3.1

      Culture & values

      3.0

      Compensation and benefits

      2.8

      Career opportunities

      2.7

      Senior management

      Future has an employee rating of 3.2 out of 5 stars, based on 714 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The Future employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Media & Communication industry (3.7 stars).

      Ratings by demographic groups

      Reviews by job title

      714 reviews
      2.0
      Apr 2, 2017

      Everything's important, except the peopl

      Anonymous employee
      Recommend
      CEO approval
      Business Outlook

      Pros

      Fairly relaxed and collaborative working space, with no strict hours policy, and no barriers to working with people throughout the business. Good opportunities to gain exposure very quickly to most facets of the company, which is less likely in other media houses.

      Cons

      The culture of fear. It becomes achingly obvious, very quickly, just how brutal the view of staff in Future is. Within weeks, if that, you'll notice the first people that are suddenly not there anymore. Then more will be gone. It's a pure asset/liability tightrope at Future, as far as staff are concerned and, as the business continues to actively move away from focusing on content (whatever hooey they spin to the contrary), and instead focusing on affiliate sales, anyone not pushing or contributing to that agenda have their days numbered. The management team are petrified of Zillah too. No-one dare make a stand, or even dissent, so everything is essentially micro-managed, and teams are doing work that EVERYONE knows is wrong-headed, but are doing it anyway 'because the boss says'. It's not sane to try and develop a career in such an arbitrary business, so avoid, which is a shame to say, as there are a lot of good people still here. But, they'll get made redundant and replaced with graduates by the end of the year too.

      avatar
      Future Response
      8y
      As former employee we are sorry to hear you felt this way while working at Future. We always encourage our employees to give feedback to their People Partner or discuss with their line manager because it is the people in the boat that matter and the employees are our first priority. It is true that we are a commercial business and so all of our ventures need to have feasible and valid returns on investment so that we can remain profitable and competitive in the market. However, Magazines still contribute to a huge chunk of our revenues and we are incredibly proud of the content within. We value all our teams and we try to be as transparent as we can. We have lean teams with a lot of expertise within their field. Within our competitive market we are proud of their flexibility and dedication because those are the things that are needed.
      1.0
      Jun 22, 2022

      Overworked and underpaid

      Staff writer
      Recommend
      CEO approval
      Business Outlook

      Pros

      Unlimited holiday for those with time (and permission) to take it

      Cons

      Overworked and underpaid No empathy from senior management High staff turnover Hostile against remote hiring due to 'office culture' High levels of burnout

      avatar
      Future Response
      4y
      Hi there, We're very sorry to hear that you don't feel fairly compensated. We thought it might be helpful to clarify our approach to pay-rises. We have given all colleagues an annual pay rise over the past few years which on average has been in-line with inflation. In addition to this we provide 'exceptional' payrises on a monthly basis to colleagues where it is deserved to reflect progression on an individual level. If you believe you should be considered for an individual pay rise and would like to expand the discussion beyond your direct line manager please contact us in the People team at ThePeopleTeam@futurenet.com and we can help to support the discussion. We'd also like to clarify in terms of location, a large part of our recruitment strategy at the moment is focused on Cardiff in the UK and Atlanta in the US as you rightly point out we want colleagues to have the option of living in lower-cost locations outside of major cities like London. Given you are a remote worker we would encourage you to share your feedback directly with us at ThePeopleTeam@futurenet.com so that we can incorporate it into the actions & next steps from the Engagement survey to try to make sure that all colleagues feel supported by and connected to the organisation.
      1.0
      Feb 16, 2022

      Not great...

      Anonymous employee
      Recommend
      CEO approval
      Business Outlook

      Pros

      There are some genuinely good lower-level managers who care about their teams, but they're so downtrodden by the Exec team that they're not able to make their own decisions or have their decisions overturned. There are small pockets of culture still remaining, but these are mostly from acquired businesses like TI media and Gocompare. It's nice to interact with these people but it makes you feel sad that their culture hasn't spread to the rest of Future. You'll know very quickly if this is the kind of business you want to work in. If you like fast-pace and constant change, this is the place for you. The CEO knows what shareholders want and the business is successful.

      Cons

      Future is extremely hierarchical and the CEO calls all the shots (even where the cost to the company is minimal - I genuinely don't know how she has time to be involved with what seems like every low-level decision). I get the impression that the Exec team hide behind and blame her when they have to make unpopular decisions (or they just don't agree and are too scared to say it to her face). Even if you're a junior employee, your Exec member has to sign off any flexible working request which is just ridiculous when they probably don't even know who you are. Work/life balance is poor. You're expected to take on an unreasonable amount of work for the hours you're contracted for and the workload just keeps increasing. The tech and systems in this business are outdated and not fit for purpose. You'll spend 4x the amount of time a simple task should take, just because of the manual workarounds you have to do. Teams also duplicate work because there's no communication as a result of everyone having too much to do. The WFH piece was poorly thought out/communicated. During the pandemic, the CEO said that working fully remotely would be an option if managers agreed to it. This was then changed to having to be back in the office at a minimum 3 days a week on days dictated by senior managers/Exec. Personally, I like having the option to work in the office and can see the value in interacting with people in person, but the way this was communicated to the business was condescending at best. Your employees are adults and understand how they work effectively. Give people the option to be flexible. Some people work best from home, others from the office - don't treat them like children when they've been making you money for the past two years working from home with no wellbeing support during a global pandemic. There is no culture. At all.

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