Pros
1. Salary - Lack of qualified professional (which is a BIG downside actually helps here) leads to lateral hires being able to negotiate hikes upto 100%. CAVEAT :: They will balance this out eventually with dismal increment numbers. 2. Flexible Timings - This is both good and bad. One can walk in at 12pm and walk out at 4:30pm as long as your manager knows or does not come to know. Its not an advantage when the co-worker you need help from or have a meeting with follows this approach and your deliverable gets delayed 3. Generous usage of office stationery - Dont know if this is really something to be considered while accepting/not accepting an offer but they there is literally no check or limit on the number of print outs/photocopies one gets done 4. Office Location - Close to the metro station, ample (self paid)parking available 5. Leaves :: Paid Time Off (PTOs) are approved more or less at ease, provided asked for 2-3 weeks in advance
Cons
1. Firings :: Firings at Oneshield are frequent and done in most un-professional manner. There are no warnings, there is no notice period you are asked to serve within which you can look elsewhere. Its done by calling you to the HR cabin, asking you to write and sign a letter resigning from the company, after which you are directly sent outside the company along with the security gaurd. Your belongings are packed by the colleague who sits next to you and handed to you outside of the company premises. If you ask for a reason, you are told 'We cant afford you anymore(This was said to an employee who spent 5 years with the company)', 'Your performance is not upto the mark (This was said to an employee who got appraisal effective 1stOct'19 and fired on 13thNov'19)', All this is done in a duration of 15 minutes in full view of other employees. 2. Lack of Qualified Professionals :: MSc's, MCAs from nowhere dominate the crowd here. They had a 'Director' no less who was a mere BSc, he too left within a couple of months of being here. There are hardly folks with Engineering degrees much less from credible colleges. People from Training/Teaching backgrounds not remotely related to IT are 'Senior Managers'/'Managers' 3. HR :: HR is the worst department at any company, Oneshield out-does them all. India office has 3 HR employees, none of whom know the first thing about Human Resources. The one heading the department is most clueless, walks in at 1pm and out at 10 pm, any and all queries pertaining to payroll remain unanswered, he barely knows anything about Investment/Flexi Components. No policy is documented. They recently started an office at Goa, employees who travelled to Goa for orientations were verbally communicated certain TnCs, upon return when they tried to get their bills reimbursed they were told a different version of those policies. Refunds of those expenses are still held up, pending for 6+ Months. Oneshield operates by means of the most non-transparent set of rules/policies 4. Pathetic Office Interiors and Facilities :: There are no facilities in the company, there is not even a coffee vending machine for God Sake. Employees make tea/coffee using tea bags in the microwave, which is tedious as hell. There are barely 20 chairs in the cafeteria (its actually not even big enough to qualify as a cafeteria, its the size of your kitchen), at rush hours usually between 1:30-2 it becomes chaotic. Let alone cab services/tuck shops. Their version of tuck shop is the office boy whose name employees yell out across the floor asking for 10 rupee packets of munchings. 5. Teams working of 5 different time zones :: Oneshield has hired onroll employees as well as third party folks from countries operating in 5 different time zones, which is most disadvantageous to Indian employees who tend to as well as are forced to respond to emails/chats as early as 8 o clock in the morning to 11pm at night. Team based in US contributes little to nothing to the sofwtare development process. The amazing part is they leave at their designated time, even while applying a patch/release onto a server mid way, which blocks the entire India Team (which does all the heavy lifting) from using the servers 6. Appraisals :: Appraisals are typical as incase of any LALA company, there are the chosen ones who lap up 20-25% while they are rest who dont make it to the higher single digits. The disparity is beyond imagination 7. Atmosphere :: There is constant fear amongst employees as to who gets fired next, there is constant politics and one-upmanship. The CTO or the highest authority in the India office whistles his way to the office each morning, looking for people to greet him while he walks past them without any acknowledgement, this is what sets the trend for other senior employees in the company 8. No Projects :: Oneshield loses projects left and right. Within the last one year that I have been here, they have lost 3 projects, the ongoing project which employs nearly 70% of the total strength of all employees (including the ones from the 5 other time zones) is in serious risk of going away. They have no significant upcoming projects 9. Redundant Technology :: Oneshield has its version of a self help tool using which configuration is done. This just dont have a coding approach, the UI is 'configured', which is particularly risky as our technical skills become outdated and also we become out of touch. The testing as well is completely manual, attempts to 'Automate' testing has failed 10.Parking :: There are just 10 dedicated parking slots for 4 wheelers allocated to Oneshield, which are occupied by those who have retirement plans from Oneshield, there are about a dozen two wheeler slots. Most of the parking is on First Come First Serve Basis and is chargeable to employee, not reimbursed by the Company 11.Interview :: They have 4-5 interviews starting from Apptitude, English, Technical, Manager round and HR Round. The process is way too lengthy especially for a virtually unknown company with no recognition in its own domain of P and C Insurance 12.Brand Value :: Zero. Enough Said!
