Pros
The core ethos of this company is fantastic. They are truly committed to sustainability, and Dale is a great face for the company. There are many employee benefits such as on site canteen, discounts for local businesses, and healthcare. The pay is below market average for almost every role, but I believe these benefits do make up for this.
Cons
One of Ecotricity’s core values is ‘We strive to be open, fair and ethical’. If that truly was adhered to, this could be a fantastic place to work. Sadly, more often than not, this is not the case. Working in different departments is like working in completely different companies. Almost all departments are completely siloed from each other. Some departments are run so poorly, with no strategic vision, cohesive ways of working, framework of accountability - and in the worst cases, no basic respect for staff. I believe the reviews on this website are so mixed because of this reason. Many departments have a very toxic culture, rampant with incompetence, misogyny, homophobia/transphobia and racism from middle to high management. I have overhead some of the most disgusting things I have ever heard in my life from high-level managers at this company, with no accountability or repercussions. The HR department very rarely intervene, and these areas have a very high turnover of staff. These poorly run departments tend to silo work on a small handful of particularly driven individuals, whose only reward from management is more work, not recognition or pay. When these team members inevitably get burned out and leave, remaining team members have to scrabble around to pick up the pieces, and the level of customer service and range of offerings the company can give to the end user suffers. Yet the cycle repeats year after year, seemingly being a lesson we can’t ever learn from. Your experience here is entirely dependent on the department you land in, and how good that departments management is. There is very little support for managers, so how good the management is in any given department, is almost entirely reliant on whoever the manager is, and how they are personally. This also means that some managers get too personal, and give favourable treatment (pay rises, job opportunities, ignore mistakes) to staff that they personally like. It is very clear that Ecotricity started out as a small local business, where “what the boss says, goes”. The company has since grown massively, and some departments have grown with it, and thrive. Sadly, many departments have not, resulting in siloed, toxic and unprofessional environments.