Toxic director in Malaysia mental health company
I've been thinking a long time if I want to write this since Soul Space Therapy has ceased operations early this year but I still feel very bothered by what happened so I feel I should share my experiences. Also because I'm confused at how one company that has two directors (I'll refer to them as 'A' and 'B' in this post) who are so different in many aspects from leadership, communication, the way they treat others in the company, the way they show up as an employer or human being, etc can operate a business together. Maybe that's why the company ended up this way.
For context, I used to be an associate there.
First off, from my experience the atmosphere tends to tense and feel unpleasant whenever 'A' is in the office. My experiences with her are generally unsupportive, no guidance, unapproachable and sometimes unkind. I thought it's just me but when I asked other people, they shared the same.
I also witnessed she physically assaulted another staff and brushed it off as a joke. This happened in front of other staffs and interns. I guess someone told 'B' after that because she investigated and verified with us one on one about it. I think she confronted 'A' because I heard 'A' then asked few of the people about their experiences working with her but to be honest no one dare to tell her the truth. I was and I'm still shocked by this until today because I cannot imagine someone doing this to another person.
I was also affected by the delayed payout few times for work that I've done. It was communicated to us via emails by both directors separately.
'B's' email: 'B' has provided all payslip and amount prepared and verified by external accountant to 'A' to initiate the payments before 'B' can approve but 'A' has refused to. Company has sufficient cash flow for all payouts and 'B' cannot bypass the protocol to approve payment if 'A' does not initiate due to the legal limitations.
'A's' email: 'B' has blocked her access that's why she cannot verify the figures and initiate payments.
Based on the emails received, 'B' has also asked 'A' to proceed with the initiation many times but 'A' refused to. Eventually, some of the affected people reported to the labour office and I heard in the labour court, the officer called 'A' out for obstruction and instructed her to proceed according to 'B's' instructions. But 'A' justified to the officer by saying she was blocked from operational access hence she cannot initiate the payments. But I heard 'B' then presented many evidences to show that 'A' does have access to all platforms and information within her legal rights and required for her director duties, and the operational access was blocked as she discovered 'A' secretly set up a same counselling business on the side and reached out to Soul Space's clients to go to her new business while she's still a director which means she caused harm to company and other director. So 'B' had to block her access to operations to protect the company's interests. Eventually officer said 'A' was in the wrong, should have not involved anyone in directors dispute and its reasonable for the access to be blocked because of her own misconduct as it has harmed the business interests.
Funny thing is after all the mess that she created, she resigned as a director conveniently and left 'B' to clean up the mess for her. After 'A' resigned, we finally got all our payments after 'B' managed to update the payment processing roles following the resignation to initiate and approve the due amounts. It's not just the payment issue, 'A's' behaviours also affected everything else including sudden closure of Soul Space and us who had to explain to our clients about it and make plans of care but not being able to say the full details of closure.
There are many more things that happened but I don't want to say much to protect myself. I'm not here to badmouth or side with anyone but I feel it's only right that I share my experiences because it scares me and it's a shame that a company that's good is also ruined because of a director's misconduct. Mind you, she's still a counsellor, supervisor and even a head of psych and counselling centre in a well known university right now. And running her own counselling business.
Imagine having someone like this still being active in the mental health field and going about without having to be responsible for what she has done, at the same time still training and supervising new trainees and seeing clients herself, it just gives me a huge ick.
P/s: If you know what I'm talking about, please share your experiences.
If you have worked with 'A' or 'B' before, please share your experiences too, how it's like working with them.
After what I've experienced and witnessed, I'm genuinely curious if it's normal to have people like 'A' in the mental health industry and holding important role in education setting? Seems like nobody is doing anything about this.