Pros
I completely agree with the points raised by "engineering mass exit" The following are positives that were meant to be brought in by the new executive team: - Numbers driven planning and allocation; except when you ignore your engineer's requests for more headcount to drive the 5-6 new projects that are being targeted. - New leadership who will hold us accountable, except when they plan to bail after less than a year. - New leadership who expresses a desire to be open to employee concerns, except when they hold skip levels where they don't let other employees get a word in between their speeches aggrandizing themselves. - New leadership who expresses a desire to be open to people's feedback, except when those concerns damage their egos, after which management is deployed to warn employees to be less honest in their feedback. - New leadership who wants to empower their employees with decision making; like the decision making made when we need to hope our estimation of the social and building infrastructure budgets matches the number you have already decided on in your head. - Lots of extra offices and cubes for employees to claim. Positives that still apply from before and now: - Novel technology solutions, both hardware and software, that can provide interesting challenges for teams to overcome, in a way that was better than the competition - Baseline compensation slightly above what else is out there. - The rare taco Tuesdays are nice. - Family picnics were nice when we got any sort of non-miserable amount of resources to plan them. - Nice building renovations. The new coat of paint really helps. Touchdown area feels super spacious now that we removed those pesky cubes we used to have people in. - There's a brewery (Rough Draft) next door that is solid, and a distillery/bar (Cutwater) down the street that is excellent. - On the ground engineering pool is top notch. Should any fires arise, its reassuring to know that there's a great team full of talented minds at your back to support you.
Cons
I completely agree with the points raised by "engineering mass exit" - Middle management is defeated. "I know and we're trying XYZ" are nice words, but no results and a continuously sinking relationship with upper management is impossible to stomach - Executive management's strategy appears to be a transparent pump-and-dump scheme that worked for simpler companies with largely analog sales-based portfolios (see Genband, Ribbon) - Repeated tales of retribution or lashing out by executive level in the face of fair criticism. - Repeated tales of executive level misrepresenting the words of engineers to better fit their agenda. - Repeated overvaluing of a sales department that for all intents and purposes appears to entirely be entirely driven by the CEO's buddies. - Repeated undervaluing of an engineering department that has experience and rapport, but are ignored because clearly we just haven't tried things the right way yet. - Repeated round tables that are presented as good effort communication with the masses, but are actually sessions to steamroll or ignore your employees concerns - Constantly decreasing transparency, whether its zero communication for employee departures (layoffs, firings, or otherwise), or changes to process that we're expected to follow - Transparent attempts at making appearances better with refurbishments, shiny things, and cleanliness, while simultaneously shackling legitimate efforts to improve the company - Extinguishing any efforts to sustain social culture at the company, by cutting off our legs or encouraging an "us vs them" internal competitive culture, e.g. race to the bottom for picnic budgets. - Went from understaffed HR who were difficult to contact when issues occurred, to no HR onsite, period. - Severe case of castle without its king, with executive offices that sit empty for weeks to months at a time. - Overall a truly staggering dissonance between the people steering the ship and the rowers below.