Uncaring Dev Managers, Lackluster VP’s, Inexperienced CTO—Oh My! - Senior Software Engineer Lessen Employee Review

Continued education and product knowledge. Remote work available

OT only offered on holiday work days

Employees have strong potential and are capable of delivering quality work when supported by effective leadership and clearer project direction. But unfortunately, leadership is not effective and helpful here which I’ve described below.

The Agile process needs significant improvement. Collaboration between onshore and offshore QA teams can become challenging, especially when reported issues are frequently dismissed or invalidated without proper investigation. This creates an environment where team members may feel discouraged from raising legitimate concerns. On-shore QAs become “UAT Testers” as a result. Management involvement during demos can also feel counterproductive at times. Instead of proactively identifying and mitigating project risks earlier in the process (but they are not even involved in early discussions) , concerns are sometimes raised publicly during demos, which creates unnecessary pressure rather than constructive collaboration. There is also a noticeable emphasis on release timelines over overall testing confidence and product quality. In situations where testing risks are raised, they don’t receive sufficient consideration if release goals are prioritized. When issues occur after release, accountability tends to fall heavily on QA teams despite broader project and process factors contributing to the outcome. QA documentation standards did not always appear to be applied consistently across all levels of the organization. Some leadership-level QA contributors were able to provide minimal to no testing documentation while expecting more rigorous standards from other team members. Lastly, the recurring fear of layoffs created a culture where some employees felt pressured to prioritize visibility and management approval over open communication and constructive collaboration.