WSP reviews

Awful during the pandemic (reason why I left). Enforced pay cuts on all staff earning more than £30k. Not a good look for a company to cut staff salaries in the midst of a pandemic where no one knew what was going on (especially lower levels where staff are living practically hand to mouth on their monthly salary). To put it into context, the company profits grew (still brought companies and also paid dividends to share holders lol). Working from home also was not supportive (a pain to get approval for extra screen, keyboard. I had to buy my own due to the approvals required. Managers and team leaders often left in the dark about big decisions coming down from the top (I.e. pay cuts) or perhaps they acted like that didn’t know at all. Try to enforce Equality, Diversity and Inclusion but do a terrible job at it. Definitely talking the talk and not walking the walk. Witnesses numerous racist/sexist/ableist incidents and none received the due care and attention required. Tight project budgets, often work in your own time to not blow budgets. Q&A procedures not air tight, many mistakes made on projects and blame is often shifted to staff on lower levels- mistakes are the responsibility of the final approver in my opinion. No HR presence. Terrible line management training.

I experienced many cons while working for WSP, but the highlights were... 1. Out-of-the-blue employment agreement change on second day of job (from salary to hourly) 2. Middle management was not being informed about what was going on for my project. 3. Project management for my assignment seemed very disorganized at times and incompetent during others. Examples include a) Myself and others (young, new employees) were tasked with rewriting procedures and field observation forms when the originals were deemed insufficient. b) PM was hiring temps/contractors like crazy and then suddenly there were laid off due to lack of work. Many direct-hire personnel (including myself) were furloughed with zero notice, while PM knew in advance that would be a shortage of billable hours. c) HR was disorganized (see a)) to such an extent that it took 5 months for me to receive a company-issued laptop, as HR was under the (incorrect) impression that I would be short-term hire. 4. Middle-management turnover. Over the span of my short time with the firm, the following people resigned: 1. person who signed my offer letter 2. HR person who issued my offer letter 3. first boss 4. second boss 5. I encountered a very bro-ish culture that at times felt very unprofessional and unwelcoming. By "bro-ish," I mean that many of my colleagues projected a "tough" and almost seemingly amateurish attitude about many things. This created an atmosphere not quite of fear, but definitely somewhat intimidating. 6. Because of of how PM managed us, the culture made me feel reduced to a body who could burn billable hours. On the PM side, there was very little interest in addressing concerns with how the project was run (see also the no-notice furlough issue).