Pros
- Will hire into the Variant Scientist role without experience, unlike many other companies, so it's a great place to get experience - Will hire remotely (although if you live in Chicago, be prepared to fight with HR about it) - Able to build relationships with genetic counselors, pathologists, and bioinformaticians - Most of the people working there (except most senior leadership) are really great to work with
Cons
- The teams in the reporting pipeline (wet lab to variant science) are extremely understaffed, under-resourced, and overworked. We as variant scientists were promised additional resources (engineering and bioinformatics support, operations support, etc.) in January 2022 and it has not yet materialized. Working overtime almost every day because senior leadership won't accept that there are simply not enough people to handle the ever-increasing workload. - 15 people left the variant science team in 9 months and despite everyone who left giving the same reasons, nothing about compensation or workload has changed. Significant brain drain is occurring and will continue to occur. - Pay is easily $20-$30K below market rate - Benefits don't make up for lack of pay (no 401K match, little to no equity options, health benefits are pretty middle of the road) - "Unlimited" PTO is great if they actually let you take it; but if your team is overworked you will not be allowed to take time off - Team leadership who was advocating for better working conditions and resources was actively undermined by senior leadership - Senior leadership, including CEO, will refuse to acknowledge the work the variant science team does - despite the fact that 80% of the company's bottom line goes through that team. Example: an updated assay was launched and was announced at a town hall, with no acknowledgement of the curation or validation completed by the VS team. - CEO will tell you in the face of racism, global pandemic, and growing fascism, that you just need to keep your head down and focus (stated in a town hall June 2020) - Quality and regulatory compliance are an afterthought. Speed is valued above all else, to the detriment of patients. - Newly released internal products are not iterated on. Once the Minimum Viable Product (MVP) is released, production teams move on to the next item, unless it's so broken that you can't get reports out. If it's only a little broken, the team is expected to absorb that.
