Good but beware of unethical action in North America
Pros
They have a good benefits package with health care, life insurance, 401k matching, and vacation. Technology is excellent with up-to-date computing equipment. The people are friendly with many gathering outside of work developing friendships which last beyond employment.
Cons
The people will keep you here but rarely the leadership. Upper management continues to maintain the positional gap that has existed for decades from one regime to the next. Reorganization is used as the 'patch' for poor decisions in corporate leadership. Employees are smart enough to see that the persistent reorganizations are more trendy and bolster financial numbers more than they are beneficial to the employees. HR seems to have the highest turnover of any department. Sadly they check all the boxes for stereotypical HR always putting the Company above ethics and in some cases violating legal precedent. There is more focus on those who directly "sell" to the customer and less on those who support them. If you are salaried and not in sales or direct customer support then there is no comp time. Watch out for managers who simply don't like someone since without accountability they can and often do make life miserable for an employee. The opportunities for promotion are rare and generally not encouraged unless upper management approaches you first. GEA outsourced their global IT operations to Accenture in India, Philippines, and Romania. IT support is primarily reactive and not proactive. IT seems to have more frequent reorganization than the rest of the company especially every time the German CIO is replaced. Layoffs happen. Layoffs improve financial numbers so a bad outlook is spun positive. The company thrived in 2020 through COVID and later with remote work arrangements. Did they learn of the value of remote/hybrid work arrangements? No. In 2025, as they force a return to an 80% in-office requirement, they are 'releasing' many good employees who don't comply.
