Ethics: Hypocrisy is the word; vast amounts of time & resources are spent on core values & safety policies that are ignored by management when it is necessary to do so to save their own skin (I personally witnessed several instances). Rampant violations of State & local governments laws, internal audits, & even laws & regulations of foreign governments.
Management: Good ole boys club designed to provide their friends and families with good cash flow. Promotions, hiring and assignments based on who you know, who you sleep with, or what your last name is (being white and male are a great plus of course).
Diversity: Women can advanced as long as they fall in the categories. Small groups of minorities are used as tokens of diversity and not as a real way to advanced the company through diversity of ideas.
Technology: Lots of cash were spent on everything with very little results. IT (formerly "IM") was/is a joke, not recommended to professionals who want to acquire real world experience or apply industry standards; for example, until a few years ago several IT groups didn't use version control software. Usually, business managers and team-leads with backgrounds in Agronomy & Biology micro-manage how IT implements technological details resulting in a mix of badly implemented or obsolete technology, for example an environment with very little Enterprise Web apps and lots of bloated desktop apps. Multitude of smaller groups doing redundant work with little actual working products to show for it. Sophistication is using SharePoint to create "sites".
Performance: Poor performers always got away with it so long they were part of the categories above, specially if they were "lifers" who knew everything about the company and the processes "back in the good old days of Pioneer". No outside ideas were accepted because the "lifers" knew best.
