Pros
Some pretty good pay and benefits. They're not afraid to spend money if something is needed.
Cons
You can't get anything done anymore without having 16 meetings about it. Try and schedule a meeting with 3 people? Next thing you know, it's got 12 people and you don't actually get anything accomplished. It takes so much time to discuss, and you then inevitably get "sorry, I have to jump to another meeting". They've hired so many people so quickly no one really knows where they fit in. They're still trying to run a 1,200 employee business like a 200 employee business. There are teams with more people managing the team, than people actually on the team, in all departments. There are "managers" without teams, they just look for things to manage I guess. The sad thing is, they've been here such a short time, they have no idea what they're doing. So many people have been here such a short time most are floundering as the blind lead the blind. I also think the owner has gotten a little tone deaf to what the employees actually need or want. We have these monthly award meetings that used to be interesting in person. Have an hour or so off work, get to meet and talk to people in the company you didn't normally interact with, and acknowledge hard work of others. Now with Zoom? It's a 2 hour mandatory lecture. No interaction, no Q and A, no break out rooms or activities, just sit and be talked at. It ALWAYS goes over time, and if you try and ignore it and get some work done they send out threatening emails to the entire company saying you have to have your camera on or you will be "disciplined". The lectures might not even be too bad if it wasn't the same thing literally every month. The owner spends about an hour talking about the founding of the company and reminiscing of "the good old days", maybe his partner speaks for a little bit (if he's not running an hour and a half late to the meeting that has been rescheduled now 4 times) and then a rapid rush through "oh yeah, there are award winners". I can probably recite all of the owner's speeches that he gives every time by heart I've heard them so many times. The 20th anniversary "celebration" was the most tone deaf thing I've seen. Nearly 3 hours of C level "leadership" patting each other on the backs, no real significant information about the company was given (nothing that couldn't have been a 1 paragraph email at least) and we were forced to stay about an hour and a half past closing on a Friday for this. Just ego stroking to an unfathomable level. HR then sends out an email both complaining and threatening us that "too many" people had their cameras off or didn't show up, while at the same time congratulating themselves on what a "massive success" it was. I hate to break it to you, but from those I've talked to, everyone hated it immensely. Cameras were off because people were cooking dinner, playing video games or watching TV by multiple first hand accounts from people I've asked. Sure, they changed this policy after complaints, and they won't do meetings like it after hours anymore. Great, now we have to give up our lunch hour. The other comments about "runners" are very true. They have almost 0 work life balance. I get teams messages at 11 at night fairly frequently, or other times at 5am. At the beginning of covid and working from home, a few departments and really the organization as a whole, said no meetings during lunch. Take that time to recharge. I think that lasted all of maybe 2 to 3 weeks? "I had to schedule the meeting over lunch, it's the only time people were free". Yeah, because we're all stuck in meetings the rest of the day. We're supposed to be done at 6pm. If you get a teams message at 7 and don't respond to it, you're looked down on. The owner will say in the meetings how important work life balance is, then the very next sentence is "these awards are for the people who don't know how to stop. The people emailing at 1am, the people who don't quit. The people who make sacrifices for company and don't know the stop of the work day and everyone in the company should be trying to do the same or you should leave". Those last few words, exact quote, he's said on more than one occasion. Deadlines will be created not asking the people doing the work how long it will take. I assume the owner asks the department heads how long it would take whenever he has an idea, and they just throw out a date. Doesn't matter what other projects are going on. This goes for all departments. They constantly put the cart before the horse, starting campaigns before a project is even finished and expecting everyone to scramble to get it done. I can't tell you how many times I've asked "why are we agreeing to this? This is insane" and the response back is "I agree, but what can I do, say no? I don't want to get fired". Lastly, I'm not the only one who feels like this. Not putting words in anyone's mouths, but, you can't deny how many people have left, so clearly there's a significant number of reasons to leave this company. Sales has a massive turnover rate, IT are leaving by the dozen, marketing I think MAYBE 1/4 of them have been here more than a year while staying roughly the same size. The CTO has been gone for months without a replacement, the CMO is leaving in a month, and the one directly beneath him quit as well.
