Poor Management, Toxic Environment
Pros
- Given a good team and manager, engineers can succeed and learn a lot. However, these are extremely rare. Most people are fired or leave after <3 years.
Cons
Poor Management - Culture of 'extreme ownership' is weaponized against engineers. Engineering teams are severely understaffed, employee burnout is high, and teams face political arguments/drama with other teams. However, managers blame engineers for all negative outcomes, citing 'extreme ownership'. You are on your own to deal with both technical challenges and managerial challenges. Managers do not help employees solve problems or grow. - Double standard work expectations; many managers work fewer hours than their employees. Expect to work 12-16 hour days to solve problems and have that work go unappreciated by your manager, who instead will blame you for schedule delays despite working at your physical limit. - VP/executive direction is often misguided, forcing employees to work overtime on tasks not worth doing. For example, I was asked to perform technician duties for weeks as an engineer. - Employees have an average 3 year tenure. You hear about a few employees mysteriously leaving the company every month; managers and employees pretend to ignore this, and badmouth/gossip about former employees - Lots of gossip and backstabbing by teammates/coworkers. Certain teammates do no technical work, but instead weaponize gossip. Managers play favorites
