Habitat for Humanity reviews

Working here was a complete 180 from my experience as an outsider (volunteer) and my previous impression of Habitat, especially in the office. Turnover is extremely high, and current senior management has no competency or experience in construction or real estate, which is kind of important for a homebuilder. Most employees (managers and non-managers) with talent or applicable experience turn over quickly because they get frustrated with the lack of common sense and bad decisions consistently made by management and quit, or they question that authority and bad decisions and get fired for hurting someone's ego. Since senior managers have no good experience in handling the business of Habitat, all decisions originate with board members, many who are very experienced and knowledgeable. Unfortunately those worthwhile board members are busy working and running their own businesses, so most time, decisions, and involvement fall to retired, non-working, or inexperienced board members that are busy-body limousine liberals and treat the affiliate like it's their own pet project. In my time there, I saw millions of dollars squandered in bad real estate transactions and in growing a bloated office staff that contributed nothing to housing production, operations, or raising money. Despite the fact that we all worked in the same physical space, every small department was extremely siloed and there was absolutely no accountability in terms of an individual's role or work output. As long as you talked the talk, you wouldn't get fired for not doing your job. No one was really cognizant or interested in what other departments did, or how they needed to collaborate to get any work done. Departments that did most of the real work and heavy lifting, such as construction and real estate, were chronically understaffed and unappreciated. Much of the office staff would choose to "work from home" and come in to the office 2-3 times a week and be out of touch the rest of the time. Some managers would shirk and take off months at a time just because, claiming disability for supposed accidents or injuries at home. Beyond that, it was culturally very weird too. Collectively we all knew something was dysfunctional, so managers would espouse in meetings how we could improve transparency, be more inclusive, and grow careers and reduce turnover. The more this was being said, the more things were getting opaque with major decisions being made by 1 or 2 board members behind closed doors that didn't even know employees' names. The new CEO who started last year liked to say she was instilling a "culture of accountability" but nothing really changed. Day-to-day amongst the "little people," the office felt very much like a sorority house, replete with gossip, backstabbing, immature goofing off, and a general lack of professionalism. Most of the staff were young millennials and suffered from special snowflake syndrome. They were unable to communicate any worthy concerns or constructive criticism directly, and instead thought that going behind your superior or co-worker's back to complain was the appropriate avenue. Anyone mature enough to communicate directly with a snowflake would risk said snowflake going to a corner to cry and melt over hurt feelings. Human resource and operations managers would also abuse their power by trying to reprimand employees that weren't even under their supervision.

This is for the San Francisco Office. In 3 words: TOXIC. DYSFUNCTIONAL. MESSY. It’s glossy on the outside and broken on the inside. Organizations can go through “growing pains” and organizational change is HARD, but how long does it really take to get an organization at least somewhat functional. This is one of the most questionable Places I’ve worked, which considering how high their budget is and how critical the work they are doing – well, it’s pretty alarming. If you are not in the C Suite (or a white male), respect for employees is minimal. The lack of respect and empowerment for younger and/or newer employees is palpable, which is ironic because the CEO has a background in youth empowerment. The organization hires many incompetent people that don’t know what they’re doing or spends lots of money on addressing issues in ways that are highly ineffective, while sidelining people who bring skill, knowledge, critical thought, passion, commitment and solutions, or investing in their employees in meaningful ways. Professional development plan is non-existent, and employee performance metrics are unclear and Inconsistently applied. Nonprofits have notoriously high turnover, but this has some of the highest I’ve seen given its relatively small size. When pay and benefits are good and that turnover still exists, you know THERE IS A PROBLEM. This leads to extreme messiness and disorganization, which other people are then expected to magically fix, without the resources they need to do so properly. They are then berated when they cannot fix things. CEO is all over the place, anxious, and highly defensive. Both staff and board keep getting more and more white, which is disturbing given its mission, where the office is located and who is served. Board helmed by an obnoxious, unimpressive individual, which again, given where the org located and the incredible talent in the Bay Area, is just confusing. Despite a relatively small staff and open floor plan in the office the org culture doesn't nurture collaboration, and communication is terrible. The organization also suffers from an identity crisis – is it corporate? Grassroots? Community based? Faith oriented? An advocacy org? Strong social justice leaning? Who knows?!? It would change its identity to take advantage of opportunities without real conversation of what any of that actually meant for the work. This permeated down into the work culture, the way the organization interacts with the community, the way it administers its programs, and how it treats its employees. The confusion, sloppiness, and unhealthy work environment were exhausting. Ultimately, this office gives a bad name to the brand. I wanted to love this job, but the negatives so outweighed the positives that it was nearly impossible to do so.