Pros
I can't think of any pros.
Cons
I worked for CoBank for several years. When I first started, I thought it was the best place I’d ever worked. By the time I left, it was by far the worst place I had ever worked. Below are concerns I have about CoBank. 1) EIM management is hiring the wrong people for positions. The new hires don’t have the skills for the jobs. Management thinks anybody can be put in a position and they’ll be able to do the job. That’s not true with CoBank because of the complexity of the business and the technical environment. This sets set the EIM team and CoBank up for failure. 2) Management repeatedly underestimates the amount of time needed to do a project. This results in schedules being crunched and people working a lot of extra hours which burns people out and causes employee turnover. Several people, including myself, have said they had to recover after working at CoBank because of the stress and toxic work environment management provided. 3) Management surrounds themselves by managers who only say yes to them and they don’t welcome employee input on design or architectural issues. If an individual contributor expresses concerns about a design to try to avoid rework, they are chastised and retaliated against by management. When I worked there, many hours were spent performing rework on issues that were originally designed by management. This hiring practice is true in both the IT and EIM divisions. If I was on the board of directors for CoBank, I would be concerned about the future of the bank. I am doubtful about CoBank’s ability to make the required technical changes to compete with product offerings from other Farm Credit System lenders and also to implement required regulatory changes.
