MY QUICK TWO CENTS
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When I was employed at Wingspan Portfolio Advisors a few years ago the company would routinely do mass firings. This was when Wingspan hired way more blacks. The pay was very low even though many of the black workers had years of mortgage experience and college degrees. Many blacks made around $11.00 an hour even though the white males with far less experience were being hired on at almost twice that rate, even when they were in the same position.
The strangest thing was the company was a fun one to work for (at first) but that quickly changed when it became apparent the managers, in my opinion, lied incessantly about so many things. It was quite clear their management style was based on fear. Through instilling fear in workers at every opportunity about a shaky contract with BOA (or so they desperately wanted us to believe) they believed they could get twice the work out of everyone. And then the intimidation started. Having managers follow people to the restroom and target certain employees. Suddenly, overnight it seemed, the relationship between the employees and management turned hostile. Managers crafted an "us against them" work culture. They would go to certain employees and make them fear for their jobs unless they turned against other employees. This was evil and I've seen this happen in other workplaces when managers feared for their jobs they would try to spread that fear around. I started to suffer health problems from the stress. Several of my coworkers suddenly quit. One coworker had a nervous breakdown.
During this time Wingspan higher ups issued orders to team leads to "put everyone on paper for anything". A team lead I was cool with called me to the side and told me they were all under pressure to "stack the files" on everyone. The job environment was very chaotic. Managers were thrown together for the Bank of America assignment. Wingspan landed the BOA assignment very early before it was fully staffed up. The managers were all previous temporary associates who suddenly had multiple titles given to them overnight, often multiple promotions in a few months going from temporary to team lead to Director to V.P. and suddenly Executive V.P.'s in the span of, what I have estimated to be within a calendar year, even though they had "no prior mortgage experience. During this time the CEO of Wingspan Portfolio Advisors must have hired a very crafty marketing and publicity firm to help with its promotions because Wingspan suddenly hired (and after getting the promotional benefit from the name associations) quietly "fired" well known "highly acclaimed" individuals within the mortgage industry. This was all to give the company more "legitimacy" as it aggressively pursued more high profile and lucrative contracts. Another issue I experienced at Wingspan was many of the managers who found themselves overnight promoted several times from low wage temporary associates to "Directors, Vice Presidents, and then Executive Vice Presidents" not only lacked previous mortgage experience, they lacked previous management experience. They would give verbal instructions to us that were wholly inaccurate and when blow back from Bank of America would happen they would hide their hands and state they would "discipline" the employee even though the employees were only following "their" verbal instructions.
Not only were these actions completely unethical (to let employees take the fall for their incompetence), the company started to do random termination drives were they would terminate 50 or more employees, every few weeks, right before these employees could reach a year of employment. At the same time Wingspan was holding massive firing drives, they were doing massive hiring drives. Lines (yes, literally lines of people would walk through the building just like a cafeteria line). Just like clockwork. During this time, managers had given the team leads instructions to "stack the files" of good employees; employees who had been recognized time and time again for the excellent quality of their work, suddenly found themselves walked out, terminated for anything. Wingspan would allocate entire days where they would do nothing but terminate people who had years of mortgage experience (far more experience than even the Managers (who often had no experience) had. Wingspan had suddenly terminated (all for cause they alleged) so many people they had even terminated several employees of the month, one being terminated right after he was voted employee of the month, within the same month! Wingspan was too cheap, in my opinion, to even be HONEST with the Unemployment office and pay claims. What Wingspan was doing was a layoff but decided to lie on everyone. Multiple people had found themselves termed (or had jumped ship because of, in my opinion, Wingspan's "total lack of ethics and chaotic work environment". Fortunately the good people at the Texas Unemployment Office saw in their systems that so many people had been suddenly let go they concluded it was a layoff, disregarded Wingspan's reasons for termination, and paid all the claims anyway.
After I left Wingspan I knew of several other people to get hired there and right around eight months to a year they were all "suddenly" laid off or fired. Each and everyone. Wingspan has got to be cheating the New Hire Tax Credits in my estimation. What else can account for such sporadic hiring and firing? All at the same time each and every year?
When I tried to post an "HONEST" review on the internet on sites such as indeed.com, my review was suddenly followed by several others labeling the company as "awesome" and "the best place they've ever worked". It was so apparent that many of the reviews were FAKE. The company was very small with ONE OFFICE and we all knew each other. Everyone was scared and unhappy. Many people were quitting. People were walking off the job, not only because of inappropriate and racist language from managers but also due to the work environment being intolerable, chaotic and very hostile. Other individuals were so frightened. They were the sole bread winners for their families and the managers of Wingspan "capitalized" on this fear. Just like wolves the managers could smell the fear. If they couldn't intimidate you they either trumped up some reason to fire you or made your life so unbearable you were pushed to resign. These people were awful. On a personal note, for years I had nightmares about being trapped in the building. Not able to escape. I have never, as God is my witness, had nightmares about any other employer I've ever worked. I know that I probably have "Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome". Another coworker had a complete nervous breakdown from their experience there and they are drawing disability. Wingspan is an evil company and no glowing press report will ever make me forget my experience there. The world may never know about how this company treats its employees, especially when we worship money so in this country, but many of us do know. My experience working for Wingspan Portfolio Advisors made me lose a lot of trust and faith in Capitalism. Some of these companies, no matter how much money they make, truly are evil. Here it is years later and I'm still dealing with the health issues. Judging by these current reviews from Wingspan Employees I see nothing has changed. smdh.
On a final note, I also discovered that half their "press reports and articles" online are just "paid advertising". They are desperately trying to craft a glowing online presence which is so different than how they really are.
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