Great People Hamstrung By Leadership and Process
Pros
- You're at a company doing big things - launching people is no joke! New Glenn, delayed as it is, has solid people working very cool projects. - There are many terrific people working here. - Once established, it is easy to move around the company and find a home. Between NS, NG and ADP, there are tons of opportunities to see and do many different things. - With Jeff getting more involved recently, I'm more optimistic about Blue's future than I have been in a while. - If you find a specific "home" in Blue, the work can be rewarding enough on its own that you can persevere through the BS. That said, if you're just starting out, and/or expect the company to be exciting on its own, Blue is not the place.
Cons
- Dead weight is allowed to stick around. This lowers morale and the performance bar for everyone. - Management is incredibly out-of-touch with individual contributors. - When management does hear feedback, reactions are very often too-little too-late (ie after the company has been bleeding staff for years, they have finally reacted by increasing 401K match one percentage point and adding pet insurance) - Obsession with process, corporate structure and bureaucracy has caused many people to feel that they have lost ownership of their work. This leads to slower, lower quality work with little motivation to go above and beyond. - Human flight certification is being used as an excuse to stifle engineering improvements on New Shepard. While the vehicle is generally robust, so many small changes could massively increase our turnaround and overhead work scope. - Recruiters are slow to contact candidates and even slower to extend offers. It is critical that they strike while the iron is hot to improve candidate yield.