Extravagantly Top-heavy.
Lack of Meritocracy; Poor Treatment of Diversity; No Motivation for Change.
Hypocritely Nice - Passive Aggressive Attitude Highly Credited.
I met too many honest and talented "Local" people while working at EMN especially in technology and production. I empathize their worries about future and would like to exclude them from my criticisms here.
That being said, the "Local" elites rule this company and toxicate the culture by placing unskilled and/or spineless people in the middle management. Generally, there is not any clear metric for a manager's performance anyways. There are project leaders or directors who have no clue about their portfolio and/or skills they manage. At EMN, you may keep asking yourself, why is this guy here? and What does s/he really do? Before I left EMN, I started to speculate that these people must have simple missions like KGB/FBI agents who profile and collect information about the others. Unfortunately, I failed to find any other rationale..
If you join the club and "liked" by the right people, you can survive with simple responsibilities given to you such as being a meeting facilitator. I am not kidding - such roles exist, for example, at Corporate Technology!
The saddest story is that there are decision-makers in this company who are extremely incapable and reluctant to give any (useful) directions to their workers, while proudly acting skeptical and critical on any recommendation brought to their attention.
There is also a silly myth going on in the company that if you have an "analytical" or a "driver" type of social style, you tend to get things done correctly. This is a tiny example of how the passive aggressive culture is justified among people. Honesty and Sincerity are usually blacklisted and not found welcome (or normal). Unnecessary questions and vague criticisms are, on the other hand, always welcome.
It is hard to operate productively in this culture, as you cannot catalyst any innovation with a positive attitude. You will be labeled as an optimist or a radical.
I have not even mentioned the situation of skilled immigrant labor, who are generally sidelined and given little to no responsibility until resolving the residency situation. I also heard that some people make fun of them in the "club" gatherings.
Again, for the good of Local and Honest workers and the region, this company should be purchased by a Bigger Peer and get trimmed from the top by the new parent. I do not see any other sustainable solution.
