Oh man where do I even begin…
If you’ve ever read “The Phoenix Project” which is a book used to describe how NOT to run IT departments/companies - every single one of the undesirable behaviors / patterns is on display here plus a lot of others.
I have worked here for less than a year and a half and I have seen 5 reorganizations so far ranging from top level management being fired without being replaced to entire company wide restructurings around unproven AI products. This last restructuring has caused any remaining competent employees to simply throw in the towel and walk away leaving only the people that can’t leave and the people who just joined and have no idea what the extent of the problems are across the organization.
The company itself cannot seem to orient itself around a singular goal or North Star - this seems to be left up to middle management to interpret so a lot of the day to day work you end up doing is likely going to be tied to someone’s pet project.
Overall, I have found a lot of the projects and work I’ve been done to be entirely meaningless and disconnected from the company’s mission of which I am still not clear on. Any interaction I’ve had with leadership has been unimpressive and their opinions about direction of the company are mostly uninformed and untested - they are just firing from the hip 99% of the time. If things go awry, they’re somehow able to write it off without any repercussions and the org quickly forgets about it and finds the next shiny project to chase (eg the Super Bowl which was a complete flop but internally we were all informed that it was a massive success despite all indicators). The new project takes the place of any old work and lower level employees clean up the mess in their spare time.
Also despite what articles you may have read online, the company itself is a total zombie corporation - meaning it keeps up operations by funding itself with debt instead of profits. This will catch up to it eventually. You will not have any hope of getting paid out in the event of an exit.
All that said, I don’t entirely regret working here. I met some cool people. But I’m tired of putting on a smile every day to work for people who don’t deserve my time and energy.
