Emails about a so-called blacklist are circulating in the management of Sopra Steria’s largest department. Now the consulting company is announcing a full internal clean-up.
Less than 3 hours ago
“Put on blacklist”
“Get on the blacklist”
“Blacklist?”
“Check that she’s on the Blacklist”
This is what Odd Inge Bjørdal, director of Sopra Steria’s largest department, writes in e-mails that go to the entire management in his department.
Bjørdal is also part of Sopra Steria’s management team and has been with the consultancy since 1999.
E24 has gained access to e-mails where former employees and external candidates are put on a so-called blacklist.
The e-mails E24 has seen contain a name and a short sentence about “blacklist”, but no justification for why the person has been put on the list.
In the department Bjørdal leads, 1,500 people work. In total, the company has 3,300 employees in Norway.
Stop the practice
– The word “blacklist” should never have been used, and as manager I should have immediately distanced myself from the term, writes Odd Inge Bjørdal, director of digital platforms at Sopra Steria, to E24.
He clarifies that there is no separate “blacklist”, but that the term refers to a status which means that the person in question is not eligible for further processing.
– The practice has been stopped, and it is my responsibility that this type of language and jargon is not allowed to continue to develop in my department, says Bjørdal.
He says the practice has “existed for a number of years”.
– We have occasionally had a direct and informal tone between the managers, and I am sorry that this has developed under my leadership. This is not how managers should behave, and least of all me, as the senior manager of the department, he says further.
He says that the list has been used as an overview of proposed candidates who are not suitable for interview in a recruitment process. The purpose has been to save time and resources, according to Bjørdal.
The recruitment team in Bjørdal’s department has also received some of the emails.
– Have no words
Sopra Steria refers to itself as Norway’s leading consultancy within digitalisation, innovation and sustainability.
– That is the worst thing I have heard, says Nito lawyer Kirsten Rydne after having read the contents of the e-mails.
Nito is Norway’s largest professional organization for engineers and technologists. The organization has 520 members from Sopra Steria.
– I do not have words. It sounds so frivolous. To say something about the severity, we need to know more. But just the word “blacklist” itself makes one’s hair stand on end, says Rydne.
Announces full cleanup
– This list has never been known to Sopra Steria’s management team, writes Kristin Blix-Elton, marketing and communications director at Sopra Steria, in an email to E24.
She also writes that the company takes a “strong distance from both practice and term usage”.
She calls the practice “completely unacceptable”.
– The management has today announced a full internal clean-up in the department where the list has existed.
Responds to the content
Nina Riibe, managing director of Econa, Norway’s largest professional organization for economists, is shocked by the e-mails.
– The fact that Sopra Steria chooses to operate in that way is grave and sad. On a general basis, everyone has the right to a safe and good working environment, she says.
Econa has 97 members from Sopra Steria.
– This shows how important it is to be a member of a trade union and to have someone behind you who looks after you as an employee. When you as an individual are exposed to such a power game, you have very little to contribute, says Riibe.
– Constant pressure
E24 has previously mentioned Sopra Steria’s career program “Accelerate”, which is offered to the company’s newly graduated employees.
Employees who are part of the program have had to spend their free time attending events, without being paid for it.
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Lawyer Kirsten Rydne states that Nito has received reactions from 10 members in Sopra Steria regarding this. Several are so-called newly employed “graduates” who take part in the company’s program for new graduates.
– There are several people in the Accelerate program who have reacted to the fact that they have been put under financial pressure to attend courses in their spare time, says Rydne.
According to the feedback, Nito has experienced employees being told by their manager that there will be consequences for salary development and career opportunities if they do not attend seminars and courses in their spare time.
Sopra Steria’s communications director says the company now wants to clean this up.
– We take this matter very seriously and immediately contacted the union representatives when we became aware that the “Accelerate” program was not perceived as voluntary, says Blix-Elton.
– We had an initial meeting with the shop stewards on Friday and agree to follow up on this matter. It is our responsibility to clean this up and we are already doing so.
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