The office in Houston is horrible. You are expected to solve hard problems and you are jammed into what we called "Ikea Cubes" Shell real estate does not care about the employees only saving money (flexible work after COVID is being considered and reviewed). During down-turns there is always layoffs that cause people to turn on each other and compete for jobs then once the price of oil picks back up there is not enough people for the activity level and everyone is overworked.
In 2021 they started promoting diversity (surficial; white male from US and white male from any other part of the world are considered the same even with completely different backgrounds) over merit and I was told by a senior manager that because I was a white male I should not plan on ever being promoted into management. I know minorities have been treated unjustly in the past and have not had the same opportunities but this needs to be solved at recruiting and at the middle and highschool level. Now there are unqualified people being pushed into management roles to meet diversity numbers.
If you are in a technical role and want to climb the career latter, Shell is a place that takes a really long time to do so and technical career latter does not extend far. Coming out of graduate school you enter years of training (also a pro!) then are eventually trusted with your own work. Most geoscientist work 10+ years before getting any management experience. Part of the reason I picked Shell over EXXON when I had my offers was the possibility to work as an expat overseas, this is no longer possible for Americans (we are too expensive).
Since Shell is such a big company change is slow and when there is a business opportunity many times the smaller, more nimbal companies were able to move before we could. Shell tends to "over-science" many things and prefers to create inhouse software instead of using industry standards. This works sometimes but the software groups get funding cut and many times we end up with a half working product and are expected to use it even if the results are sub-par. Many of these complaints are specific to me and I would still overall recommended Shell as an employer.
