ryan dejersey - PMG platinum marketing group lies, steals money, charges employees their expenses, conniving, back-stabbing. edmonton, Alberta

From my experience working for PMG, I did gain experience. but I also lost self-esteem.

When I went for my first interview, Ryan seemed to only point out the golden points of the job.

and with his rebuttal to a complaint, one of the many things that were said that kind of grind my gears was how he had said "they were let go for not doing the job." That isn't true.. we were outside for 8 hours, canvassing.

You make it known that almost 99% of people will say no, simply because they donate locally or not at all.

It is almost discriminative to say that the people let go were not doing their job.

My father worked for PMG almost 10 years ago and he also said that PMG had given him false information and had higher expectations than the company was worth.

The ads on job search engines are shady, the one I read only said "If you like loud music and positive energy call this number"

the office is run-down and the "team leaders" were all over the place with their training methods.

Team night meant that we went to the bar after work, and if employees wanted to spend their own money and have a good time, management looked down upon it, Off the clock means it is none of your business.

when we were in the warm up room, it honestly felt like we were praising the managers rather than chanting for success within ourselves.

First of all i'd like to say everyone is obviously entitled to their own opinion.

Either way i think if you want to publicly try to discredit an idividual you need to have some facts and play both sides of the fence. It is fairly easy to go on a site or blog and state your opinion on everything that is negative but when there is no mention about any positives, whether it is experienced gained, relationships built or anything, i'm led to believe that you are either a disgruntled employee, or just want to complain.

Right off that bat saying that a business uses employees from the start, is just amusing. From what i know is that every business uses its employees, wether to provide a service, or supply a product. Construction companies use employees to build things. McDonalds uses employees to make burgers. As for the comment, "pushing the lie of becoming a manager", i don't understand how that is a lie. Is there advancement opportunity? Yes! Do you have an opportunity to become a manager? Yes! Platinum Marketing along with its partner agencies do provide alot of advancement opportunities. Opportunities to develop great communication skills, customer service, interpersoanl skills, confidence, work with others. Difference is compared to most jobs there's alot of applicable, beneficial experience that can be applied to several other types of employement.

Right from the phone call our goal is to have people come in for a preliminary interview. We are not interested in hiring everyone, just people that are open minded, out going, have a positive attitude and that have goals and are actually looking for purpose within work. Canvassing is part of the job as well as many other varities of campaigns such as booths, kiosks, street marketing, businees to business and events.

From the 1st day applicants are hired they do have to sign an employeent agreement, same as basically any other employer that goes over code of conduct since we specialize in customer service. We do work with non profits, child advocacy clients, monthly donors, so also included in the agreements is a child protection policy stating that if we witness any kind of child abuse it is to be reported.
 
As for the minimum production requirement of 5 sponsors, unlike most marketing companies we pay 100% hourly wage, not commissions, so just like every business there are break even points. Especially working with non profits we do not want people to take advantage of some of the campaigns that are not supervised and pay hourly wages to have someone not do the job. On top of that, people that work hard and excel have opportunities to have wage increases on a weekly basis instead of waiting 6 months to a year. To that's motivating. To have an opportunity to have raises in my wage based on the effort and on how well i do my job is a good thing. Also having full benefits to protect myself and family is the sign of an organization that cares about their employees and wants to give back.

We are exclusive to our clients which gives us alot of variety and creative control which allows us to travel into other communties. If someone is driving their own vehicle and having other employees car pool with them it is only common courtesy everyone shares in fuel costs. I have friends that work in the trades that will car pool and travel out of town. They all pitch in gas and when they have to travel out of town they definitly are not paid an hourly wage to drive to a jobsite from Edmonton to Ft. McMurray. All of these trips are not mandatory, but are voluntary. As for hotel expenses we do have hotel allowences. Considering some people are just not as responsible as otheres, as long as everyone does the job that needs to be done, hotel expenses are covered. I don't think it makes sense to have some people do the job and otheres treat it as a vacation and the company has to pay.

The good news is that there are alot of contests and allowences which are all paid for 100% by agency owners and our head office. There has never been a time where we use our clients money for contests. We believe in rewarding our employees for there hard work. We have given away a brand new car for th last 7 yrs at our annual christmas party which managers, owners, and new employees have won.

Again with any complaint there is always 2 sides to a story. I am 100% confident that the person who wrote the initial complaint is a female that had worked with us for months, ended up quitting and then a couple months after asked to be able to come back to work with our organization. We believe in giving 2nd chances and brought her back. She did very well in the business, but ended up having some problems with other employees. The same reason she quit in the 1st place. Maybe at the end of the day having a bad attitude and not being able to get along with co workers it just was not the job for you. We did not hear 1 complaint when you won a contest or had the opportunity to go on several of these trips and get increases in your wage. Most employees get terminated for either not doing the job or not showing up for work.

Either way even the ones that do end up leaving, for what ever reason have enjoyed their experience. At the end of the day, there is always going to be negative people, and aspects of any job that are not enjoyable. Welcome to life!! The one thing you can do is utilize these opportunities as a vehicle and take as much benefical experince away as you can to learn new things, and meet great people.

As for people that have not actually worked in the business or for a particular company but have had friends or aquaintances that have, you are all entitled to your own opinion. There are always 2 sides of every story. It did not matter what i did as a little boy, my mother was always protective of me and always took my side.  I suggest you let your friend speak for himself since i am sure he is an adult since he would have to be 18 yrs of age to work for the company. If he worked for the company i'm sure he had good experinces, or like the majority of people were able to utilize aspects of the business to develop skills that most likely gave him the ability to apply that experince towards other opportunities that he might not have been able to pursue before he had worked at Platinum Marketing Group.

I have been working in this business now for 11 yrs. I had come from a construction, labour oriented background. I started off in the field as a customer service rep doing promotions, providing the public with education, information, and awareness on our clients behalf. I had an opportunity to develop experience and skills without paying 10's of thousands of dollars in education by learning hands on in a positive, team oriented environment and utilizing support from other team members, agencies and our head office. that i would have never had lerart anywhere else. I had the opportunity to excel, be rewarded for my efforts, and not have to rely on seniority to become a manger. As i learnt and developed management skills, i had the opportunity to incorporate and own my own business without having to buy into the business or pay any kind of franchise fees. I have been a successful business owner for over 10 years and have taught others how to run, manage and own their businesses successfully. I have had the opportunity to travel, teach, train, develop and work with the most amazing people. I've travelled to Nicaragua with our Charity clients to see hands on the work they provide for these communities and the children we help to provide lives for that every child needs and deserves.

I really have no problems with what others say or do. The great part of life is having our freedoms that include the freedom of speech. Just make sure that when you do have something to say, take the good with the bad and vice versa and make sure that all your facts are true, otherwise they are just opinions without credibility. There are many sites such as this, facebook, plenty of fish, where people can just go to talk about other people and remain anonymous but what's the point? Does it make you feel better? If so, then try to do something worth while. Put some real effort into being a better person.

I can honestly say there are some aspects of my job i do not like but that comes with every job. The difference is being able to be proud of what you do, develop the experience that can make you a better person, and be able to see the results based on your efforts. If you are able to do that, then it makes it all worth while.

Sincerly, Ryan
Platinum Marketing Group Inc.  (President)

I would like to point out that there was no proof or comments about how the complaint was false, just that it was false and attacked the credibility of the complaint poster.

I have not personally worked at PMG but I had asked a friend about their job at PMG before they had quit. The information they gave me sounded exactly like the above complaint with some additions. The information I received left me with an uneasy feeling. I followed up with more questions and consulted local laws. Below is the information I gathered and opinions I formulated. 

-During the interview the role of door to door canvassing was played down to be a small part of the job (Canvassing was a large part of the job)
-5 people to single hotel room. (costs of hotel deducted if a certain number of sponsors were not signed up)
-$5/day for gas deducted

A few additions to the complaint involving non-compliance with minimum employment standards:
-Non-payment of wages for overtime hours.
-Requiring employees to be at work for 11am for trips out of the city and not considering the travel time as working hours. (Just the 1pm-9pm hours of work)
-Not following the regulation of employment for less than 3 hours.

I would like to be better informed by the poster of "Not True" about the aspects of the business, which you so kindly offer above. Would you please inform me about the aspects of the business that make these claims out of context?

The integrity and morals of a business really comes into question when there is clear violations of the Employment Standards Code & Employment Standards Regulations for the type of work being performed (Route Salesman). I would hope that the business standards that were learned by yourself are better than the ones currently being implemented. Cheating employees of wages that are owed to them by law is not how to run a business (I would also like to hear the legal justification for this?)

I would like to give you credit for learning how to avoid the underlying issues and learning to turn negative issues into positive ones. Turning negatives into positives is a good quality to have as a leader but morals and knowledge is also required.

I supported my friend in quitting and I am glad that I was supportive. My friend enjoyed the work but a company that does not follow simple laws makes a person question whether the company is truly doing all it can as a "non-profit" organization to support the children that get sponsored or simply lining their own pockets. The cause is just but in my opinion the management appears corrupt or at the very least uneducated, relying on "business standards" passed down by their predecessors. 

I am an ex employee of PMG and Ryan De Jersey, who is being slandered. I worked for PMG for 2 years and my experience there led me to an amazing opportunity, which I am now pursuing. I gained invaluable knowledge re: how to run a business, customer service, leadership and business standards. 

The majority of this complaint is either false or out of context. They clearly come from an individual who was very briefly employed there because they have a very limited understanding of any aspect of the business. (If you don't understand - Ask)

I know countless people who have been employed by PMG and they are either still there or have gone on to pursue other opportunities which they acquired because of the knowledge and skills they gained while employed there. Working at PMG was all about the entire team benefiting and the only people I ever remember complaining were the people who didn't have a positive attitude or anything to contribute to the team ie)the 3 day employee. 

Marketing is not an easy field, it's not for weak or lazy individuals who lack self motivation and it is often easier to blame a company for your failures than it is to take responsibility. 

I found Ryan De Jersey to be an extremely fair and generous employer, often going out of his way to make sure his team is happy, growing and advancing. 

I'm not sure how long the "complaining party" was employed with PMG but I'm guessing that it wasn't 2 years.

The support and opportunity within this company is remarkable and I would recommend anyone with balls try it out!