Pros
- R&D productivity has been better than other larger pharma peers, but currently facing a sales slump, due to poor pipeline and management being focused on M&A - Consensus based decision-making in general, but certain business units and functions are going to vary from the norm - highly selective in recruiting talent, and has evolved its HR capabilities to one where there are good tools for training, performance management and feedback (which all is important, but secondary to having good leadership) - Great training ground for managers and leaders
Cons
- Leadership has varied from being empowering, inspiring and motivating in 2 departments that I was at, to a couple of other departments where it was conflict-ridden, personality-driven and ambiguous goal-setting - Very risk-averse culture in the U.S., and Germany is always interfering and micro-managing decisions affecting U.S. teams, projects, and business initiatives; long-term effect is that all the smart and visionary positions have migrated to Germany, and U.S. has mostly been reduced to the passenger seat - Executive suite and top management of Bayer is dominated by Germans. Top Management is represented by Group Leadership Circles (GLC-1, GLC-2, GLC-3); Very poor representation of non-Germans, who often times are equally talented if not more; non-German managers tend to leave to take on leadership posts at other US or European companies