Unless you are chosen by the San Francisco management to work on new technology and ideas, there is no career path. There is no training available for those that genuinely want to be a part of it. There is no mentoring path.
The company lists as one of its values "Missionaries not Mercenaries", yet they hire contractors and temps just like any other company. They do not reward loyalty. They do not reward those that do everything they are asked to do.
The talk about One Team, yet the technology team operates with an entirely different set of collaboration tools than what is available to the rest of the company and they do not support the rest of the company when it comes to creating new solutions. There is a growing disconnect between tech and the rest of the business and the same is happening between their Jacksonville and San Francisco offices.
There are massive gaps in leadership positions throughout the company. This causes in gaps in communication of goals, priorities, and expectations. It also leads to a lack of expertise in many different areas as the managers that are there don't have time to fill all of the open positions that exist.
In the three years I was with the company, I did not hear one single communication from the owner of the company. The company exists solely to make him money and as far as the employees know, he takes no part or care in it. It used to be a family owned business, but now it is simply a Silicon Valley start up that is located in Jacksonville.
The executives are mostly located in San Francisco and have no care for the city of Jacksonville. They take no effort, as far as I could tell, in getting to know Jacksonville or its culture. We get to hear about the various reasons that San Francisco is better than Jacksonville - apparently kale shakes are all the rave out there.
This doesn't belong as a pro or a con, but if you are a Microsoft engineer, Fanatics is moving away from all MS technology.
I was very excited to stay with the company and tried to do everything I could to be a part of the future. I bought into the missionary culture and even passed up a couple of decent opportunities elsewhere in order to try to give management time to calm the chaos and give me an opportunity doing something good for the company. I wound up railroaded into work I did not want to do permanently and had no team to work with and was never given any assurance of a better future. I finally decided not to pass up an opportunity that was thrown at me and I have left.
One final note. EBITA. It is the constant goal of the company at this point, which means they are always looking for ways to cut operational expenses. That usually means operating with leaner teams. There is no guarantee of stability at Fanatics. Don't be a missionary.
