The culture at Vulcan is its chief con. The general culture is elitist and authoritarian, which is sadly ironic because Vulcan is desperately trying to brand itself as free-thinking, egalitarian, and collaborative. Unfortunately, it is largely the opposite. There is a very deep and rigid hierarchy at Vulcan. Executive management lives in fear of getting berated by the owner. That fear then gets passed down through all levels of management and then saturates the rank and file. Consequently, much of what the workers do is support their direct manager in preparing them to have a good story to tell when they get called out publicly by their own manager. So instead of doing what is best for Vulcan, employees often do what is best for their manager’s survival or career aspirations.
Communication at Vulcan is very unidirectional; namely top-down. Do not expect to have healthy debate with your manager and see your feedback make its way up the reporting chain. You are essentially told what you need to deliver, when to deliver it, and to refrain from asking challenging questions. So essentially, creative thinking, reasonable discussion, and intelligent debate are informally suppressed in this culture. Vulcan tries hard to market itself as a flat, collaborative, startup-like environment, but it tries to achieve that aim through superficial means, such as redesigning the technology department's workspace by eliminating all offices. So if you work in technology, you work in a big room with small cubes, no privacy, lots of noise, and no place to store work related items. In other words, Vulcan has recently jumped onto the “open office” bandwagon.
Much of what I say here is based on my perspective of having worked in technology for many years. There are some departments that are quite different. Some departments wield a lot of influence, and consequently, enjoy privileges not available to other departments. If you hire on to one of these departments, your experience may be a positive one. But it is this disparity among departments that is one of the greatest weaknesses about Vulcan culture. It is highly political, and who you know, or who you are, rather than what you do, that largely determines your experience at Vulcan. Cronyism, unfortunately, is a big part of work life there. Many employees in key positions are not reluctant to dole out special favors for their friends or their subordinates. This, I feel, damages the integrity of the organization.
As I mentioned, Vulcan desperately wants to be like a startup. I have worked in Silicon Valley at a startup, and Vulcan is the antithesis of the startup culture. A startup company has a flat managerial hierarchy where there is a strong sense of shared purpose (and sacrifice). In contrast, Vulcan has an extremely high manager to employee ratio. That in itself is not necessarily a problem, but there are so many managers who are unwilling to perform work that they feel is beneath them. Many managers will not even schedule their own meetings or perform their administrative, and even managerial tasks. They have their administrative assistants do that work. This is why the low-rung workers are consistently overworked. There are lots of people with ideas, some of which are good, though mostly absurd, and not enough people to actually execute the work.
Also different from the typical startup is the way that they treat I.T. employees. In a typical small technology company, the technologists are highly valued and their treatment reflects that attitude. At Vulcan, you are treated as a drain on cash. And because Vulcan does not generate much, if any revenues from technology, the tech workers essentially ARE a drain on cash. I.T. is treated as a necessary evil, so to speak. If you are looking for a technical position, just keep that in mind. You will likely be paid competitively, but do not expect a lot of respect from Vulcan management. Because of this general attitude by management, you can sometimes expect similar treatment from your internal customers. And do not expect your managers to back you when you need their support.
As some other reviewers have mentioned, HR is not your advocate. Their primary objective is to keep the owner from getting angry. Secondarily, they strive to keep the C-level managers happy. At least this is the feeling that many people have. If you consult HR with a problem, their first thought is to protect the owner and the company, not the employee. Another reviewer recommended that you should hire a labor attorney if you accept a job offer. Unfortunately, I fully agree. That is all I can legally say on that topic.
My advice to people contemplating employment at Vulcan. If you work in technology and you are sufficiently marketable, don’t waste a year or two testing the waters at Vulcan. You will likely be disappointed with the way you will be treated, relative to the other departments and companies. If you are desperate for employment, then take the job offer and “suck it up” like many of us here are asked to do. If you are not in technology, give Vulcan a try. You may end up in one of the premier departments and have a good experience.
And one last “con”, in addition to the political culture. Telecommuting is not allowed, unfortunately.
