Nepotism. This is a company where you dare not say a word about someone unqualified for a position. It will likely be someone's son or daughter or nephew, etc. On top of that there is a good ole boy network that is on steroids. If you start scratching the surface, you'll find entire teams that attended a certain university together and are obsessed with the same sports team. This also extends to contracting companies/vendors. Which ones get selected? It isn't based on qualifications or fair bidding. I've seen people let go (both employees and contractors) based on some bogus reason only to find them replaced by someone less competent who is a friend or relative of the project manager. It can be unbelievable at times. I have observed these things for a good 15 years. I have kept quiet and done my work and managed to avoid conflict, but there is almost no room for growth, which is causing me to look for other opportunities. It is also an extremely demotivating atmosphere, as you can imagine. The entire environment feeds feelings of apathy. Some of the people are caring and friendly, but no small number of them are in positions for which they are not qualified. They waste unbelievable amounts of money. If the public knew how much gets wasted, they would protest in the streets. I'm not kidding. Projects get recycled again and again due to poor project leadership. It is almost painful to witness at times. People always think government is so wasteful. They have obviously never been inside a big corporation. And then what happens when times get rough, they lay off workers, the real ones. One guy was laid off only to be brought back at a 30 percent reduced pay rate. He is one of the best and most reliable workers I have known. He has kids and works in custom Chevron apps so he had little choice but to take the offer. It makes me sick to see what big corporations are capable of sometimes. Meanwhile, none of the friends or family members got a cut in pay, and they continued their wasteful spending.
