THE GIST
At least one former BrewDog employee has discovered their personal information was provided to company leadership as part of a supposed anonymous workplace culture review of the international brewing company. The apparent breach came via third-party consultancy, Wiser, which BrewDog hired in June 2021 to conduct the review. Charlotte Cook says her name and details of conversations about her time at BrewDog—which focused on workplace safety, problems with human resources, and the circumstances under which she left the company—were provided by Wiser to BrewDog without her knowledge or consent. Wiser had previously stated plainly that any collected feedback would remain anonymous.
Cook’s discovery has triggered a complaint to the U.K.’s Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), which oversees data privacy, on behalf of her and other workers. Hand & Heart, the workplace consultancy that filed the complaint on behalf of affected BrewDog workers, says other participants in the Wiser review have also filed information requests to the company in order to find out whether their data was breached.
Cook worked at two BrewDog locations in Scotland between 2012 and 2014 and took part in the culture review BrewDog hired Wiser to conduct. However, documents reviewed by Good Beer Hunting show that while Cook and others were promised anonymity as part of the culture review, Wiser admitted that Cook’s data was “referenced in 2 emails sent to BrewDog.” It’s not clear which particular employees of BrewDog were the recipients of those emails. It’s also not known whether BrewDog representatives specifically requested information from Wiser about former employees, or whether Wiser provided that information voluntarily despite saying that would not happen.
BrewDog leadership has repeatedly referenced the Wiser review as evidence that it takes criticism seriously and is committed to improving its culture. In announcing the Wiser review in June 2021, co-founder James Watt said it would “paint a comprehensive picture of the BrewDog culture at every level.”
If the ICO acts on the complaint, it could issue Wiser a notice stating what the company needs to do to “put things right,” or the ICO could also issue monetary fines. Wiser did not respond to a request for an interview.
WHY IT MATTERS
Wiser published the results of its review in December, which found that the leadership style of BrewDog co-founders James Watt and Martin Dickie “hasn’t delivered a consistent and stable people experience.” The report also noted their “genuine commitment to change,” stating that leaders have expressed “dedication to make meaningful changes to BrewDog’s culture and inclusion.” Importantly, as a means to encourage participation among staff, Wiser promised anonymity to all participants. A letter from CJ Bedford, Wiser’s director of people and performance, addressed to former employees says, in part: “Nothing you share will be attributed to you and your feedback will remain anonymous.”
But Cook’s account and the complaint to the ICO call into question the independent nature of the report and raise concerns that its findings are incomplete or incorrect.
Having lodged a formal complaint with the ICO, Cook and other former employees are now waiting to hear how that body will proceed. On its website, the ICO states that if it believes an organization or company has not complied with data privacy laws, the ICO “can give the organization advice and ask it to solve the problem.” The ICO can also issue monetary penalties for violations; its records indicate 38 monetary enforcement actions within the past 12 months, with some fines reaching £200,000 (roughly $250,000).
Cook submitted a data request to Wiser in March after seeing BrewDog publicly share a quote, which it seemed to attribute to Wiser: “This had been the most extreme case we've seen of a small group of former employees on a mission to cause damage to a brand.” She says she wanted to know what information Wiser had collected about her “to be able to prove that this had nothing to do with me.”
She received a response to her data request in April, which indicated her information had been shared with BrewDog. Cook says this revelation makes her feel “sick and betrayed.” She says anonymity was critical to her and other participants “because of the retribution that I feared I’d face” from BrewDog leadership. The company’s cofounder, James Watt, has for months publicly stated that a small group of disgruntled former employees and others have illegally conspired against him, a claim he has not produced evidence of and which an organized group of former employees denies. Cook sent a formal complaint to Wiser one month ago; she says she has not received a response.
“Essentially, Wiser went and debriefed BrewDog about the interview despite that I’d been promised nothing would be shared and everything would be anonymous,” Cook says. “As soon as you breach anybody’s anonymity, that breaches the fundamental robustness of the process. It means that the publicly presented conclusion that there was an independent review carried out is false. It wasn’t independent.”
Another former BrewDog employee, Alexis Caldwell, who in June 2021 left her job as a regional events manager at BrewDog USA in Ohio says she also doubts the validity of Wiser’s report. Despite requesting an exit interview and repeatedly asking to speak with human resources before leaving BrewDog, Caldwell says “no one reached out to ask why I was leaving.” Caldwell says Wiser did not contact her at any point, either. She says she has feedback she’d like to share about management, compensation, and other aspects of working at the company, but she didn’t have the chance to do so.
Watt publicly stated in June 2021 that Wiser would contact any employee who’d left within the year to “welcome all feedback as an opportunity to improve.” The Wiser report itself also states a survey was sent to all former employees who’d left within the past 18 months.
“I have not been reached out to by anyone. By anyone at all,” Caldwell says. “I have a lot to say but no one wants to listen.”
Wiser’s 2021 review has been a critical piece of BrewDog’s defense against former employees’ claims of “genuine safety concerns,” “toxic attitudes,” and a “cult of personality” that precluded any criticism of Watt and Dickie’s management. Such claims were laid out in an open letter signed by a group of hundreds of former employees (of which Cook is a member) calling themselves Punks With Purpose. The letter, published in June 2021, describes harmful working conditions and “a culture of fear” at the global beer company.
For Cook, the goal remains improving the culture at BrewDog and getting a complete, valid picture of what the past and current workplace conditions are at her former employer. If the Wiser report cannot be trusted, she says, another assessment should be done.
“I would like Wiser to apologize,” Cook says. “And I would hope that maybe a more robust review could be done by someone competent.”
Words by Kate Bernot