Pros
Nice office, they kept the Cascade culture as much as they could. People are great, the main reason I stayed. Iris bought a company with great people, who worked hard, were passionate, cared about the company, were valued and had so much knowledge. At the time of writing, these people were dropping like flies.
Cons
Where do I start? I might even run out of room... * Pay & Benefits - if you move to an Iris contract, this seems quite good. However, they did tell everyone they would move to an Iris contract, then when the time came, they realised it was too expensive, so we stuck with the free fruit. Pay is below market rate, people have left for a lesser position and got more money?? Bonuses are there, you have fight for them and god forbid you get a bonus if you leave 3 months after the end of the financial year - clearly your performance for the last 15 months is negated but they are DISCRETIONARY! As a manager you can be hiring people who work under you at a much higher rate - thanks for making us feel valued... * Communication - a word missing in this place * Support - also a word not in their vocab. * Agile - another word... we pretend to be but will force you to work waterfall then shout when it doesn't work * Positive talk, thanks and being valued - again lost on these people * Focus on the negative. You could work yourself stupid and make one mistake and get a bollocking but the fact you worked like crazy for the last month and succeeded doesn't count. * Blame culture - lets focus on who is to blame for this, not fix it. God forbid if the office was burning down, they would probably stop you leaving to ensure it wasn't you that started it by interviewing and searching you all... * No work life balance - a phrase lost on them. You are expected to work until midnight - I mean hey, it's your fault you can't time manage... we expect 12 hours in 8 - why can you not do this?! On a similar note, you go above and beyond and stupidly act above your role and step up; show you are capable... not in this place, you are expected to do that and stay doing that as they will not pay you anymore... no thanks or acknowledgement of it. You will be lucky if you get Meets Expectation. * Career progression? Something else lost on them... ask and ask and ask and get nothing. Promote people to go for 'promotions' and IF they do get it.. well...you can't have the salary we were advertising.... motivation at it's best. * HR department - I am not sure I can even get into this without throwing something across the room so let's just leave it as another thing this company doesn't understand. * SMT - see above... old boys club. Get paid loads, dictate, shout, blame and are never seen. * Recruitment process - if you have 2 months to get a candidate in, interview them 200 times, give them 300 tests, have to wait 2 weeks until you can give feedback, then great... oh and you can only start looking to replace them when they leave the building on their last day...
