7y
Thank you for your direct and frank comments. I'm very sorry to be reading this review and I can tell you wrote it when you were angry, right after being let go. It has been a couple of years (I should have responded sooner) and I wonder if you still feel this way, since you are currently reaching out to us and visiting us at the office, trying to sell the product of your current organization. I'm going to respond specifically to each of your points:
"You get paid a lot for doing nothing": We have grown 8 fold in the past 8 years and our staff works tirelessly day and night, to get our work done in the best way possible. We are sticklers for quality and our happy customers tell us we provide classes that are regularly head and shoulders above the rest in terms of quality. I'm sorry if you believe you did nothing, but everyone else on the team worked very hard to achieve our great name in the industry and our amazing growth. We do tend to trust our employees and do not micromanage, so on occasion, we do have people who may take advantage of the system and work less, provide erroneous expense reports (although all expense reports are double and triple reviewed), and take advantage of the system, to the detriment of the organization, the team, and themselves. Of course, such people never last, as you unfortunately found out the hard way.
Hire and fire frequently: We are an organization experiencing very high growth. As such we do hire frequently. Perhaps we did not have this process when we hired you, but we currently have a stringent hiring practice that helps us select wonderful candidates that match our strong ethics and culture. You are right that before our current hiring process was enacted, we did have a higher turnover rate as we were not as careful in our hiring. But we have grown past that phase and now, as a result of our current hiring processes, 80% or more of our new hires are successful and remain with us for years to come.
Bring in "other companies to merge": In early 2017, we did hire three persons from a competitor. This was never a merger but we hired great individuals who had already left their previous employer. This resulted in the new VP of sales letting you go and again, I realize you were angry, but this VP recognized that, by your own admission, "you got paid a lot for doing nothing". I'm sorry you felt angry at the time but it is not our practice to "merge" with others. That has never happened in our history.
They lie about their government status: This is absolutely false. We are a woman-owned disadvantaged company and the SBA has audited us multiple times and agrees. Firoozeh is 100% owner and active CEO of Phoenix TS. Again, I think you were angry for being let go, and I'm sorry for that, but your friends and previous co-workers would appreciate you do not post false accusations about us.
Cannot fulfill government contracts: We do fulfill our government contracts. We have had great relationships with our government clients, some of whom we've maintained since 2004! Our major contracts have been renewed time and again by our clients and we have new clients every day. If we did not fulfill our contracts, we would have lost them a long time ago and would be out of business instead of having grown 8 fold in the last 8 years.
One person spun off to a new company: You are absolutely right! When we hired Claude as our VP of Sales, he was very honest about wanting to one day start his own consulting company. Firoozeh and I believe in helping and encouraging the growth of all of our employees and so, when the time came, we supported Claude in realizing his dream. We are very proud of him now and still support him 100%.
Only put family in C-level positions and are low-key racists: I'm sorry but this is another erroneous statement. My wife and I started this business twenty years ago, and in 2010, during our major expansion, I hired my very well qualified cousin as CFO (he has a masters degree in finance), because, frankly, he is really good at what he does. As we've grown, and since then, we have never hired anyone else from our family. Our leadership is comprised of very different people with very different backgrounds, all of whom are 100% committed to our continued growth and success. Other than myself, my wife and my cousin (CFO), who are Persian Americans, our COO is a European American male from Connecticut, our CTO is an African American male from Maryland, our Director of Sales and Marketing is a European American female from Maryland, our Director of Operations is an African American female from Missouri, and our Director of Curriculum is a European American female from Pennsylvania. And the rest of our company is a complete mix of races, backgrounds and religions. So you'll forgive me if I'm a bit shocked at your totally erroneous comment.
