Now you must take into consideration that I was in the software development group in a wood products company so lots of the cons are because of the legacy of a massive 100+ year old company.
- Lots of bureaucracy... to the point of comedy
- Surprisingly few passionate people
- Not especially entrepreneurial
- Extremely risk averse
- Not willing to be tactical
- Doesn't seem to interface enough/be concerned with the consumer of the products they make
- Hard to "move the needle" so lots of frustration if you have big ideas for improvement
- Cyclical business so unilateral layoffs are pretty common (e.g. 20% of every department gets cut no matter what they are working on).
- Not enough transparency into the corporate health even though Sr. Management is very communicative with the line employees.
- Company doesn't celebrate its successes enough