"The place to go, stay for a while - and go somewhere else..."
Pros
- Not a bad place to start your career in biotech / biopharma - Decent R&D infrastructure - laboratories, equipment, IT etc. (Although this depends how good was your university or previous company.) - Some good managers and scientists
Cons
#1. Most jobs are highly routine (unless you are in a very specific team) - don't be fooled by word "scientist" in the job title (unless it is preceded by a word like "lead" or "principal"). #2. Obsession with "industry experience" and typically very little recognition or appreciation for scientific and technical knowledge and experience gained in academia and higher academic qualifications (e.g. PhD, post-doc). (Unless they are hiring you for a very specific position in a very specific group.) #3. Very limited career progression opportunities. There are quotas (!) for each grade and strict rules and requirements for promotion, and there are even sneaky attempts to introduce forced "bell curve" ratings. You can move up a little bit, sure - but then you hit the glass ceiling. The fixed small number of higher positions (quotas!) has been filled for long time, typically before those strict rules were put in place, and those people are not going anywhere. So the rules have been created in such way to maintain an illusion of career progression - and that you are simply never good enough... #4. Practically no opportunities to attend professional events (e.g. conferences, workshops etc.) and very little opportunities for external training. (Unless you are in a very specific team or very senior.) #5. Not impressive salaries and pay raises, even on rare event of a promotion, which may lead to "salary creep" just after a couple of years. There were situations when new hires were paid more than people who got promoted to the same position internally. It is possible to get much better salary by taking same level job at different company than accepting a promotion at Lonza. #6. Poor management and decaying company culture. There are still few good managers, but overall it got worse in the last couple of years. A lot of middle-management is practising "mushroom management" and tends to be focused on short-term financial goals, with no long-term vision or strategy. The biggest problem with lower management (and also present in middle management to some extent) is unfair treatment of employees i.e. favouritism towards some people (typically similar to themselves i.e. "employee inbreeding") - and bearing all grudges, being unforgiving, and borderline vindictive towards the others (there are even managers who are pretty much bullies). #7. Constantly growing bureaucracy, making the company slow, rigid, unresponsive, unable - and unwilling - to change and improve, choking innovation and impeding good science.
