Pros
The only true pro of working at ProShip Inc. is the current job security the company provides. ProShip is in such desperate need of engineers (and they use that term loosely) that employees will never have to worry about losing their position. ProShip cannot afford to let any of it's employee's go regardless of demeanor or performance. This empowers employees, providing professional freedom and allowing them to behave how they see fit without fear of managerial retaliation. I consider this a Pro because employees do not have to worry about becoming unexpectedly unemployed and can safely search for an actual software engineering position while collecting paychecks from this disaster of a software firm.
Cons
ProShip uses the title "Software Engineer" as a buzzword to pull in talented Computer Engineering recruits and immediately designates these recruits into the 'Support/HUB" department. Do NOT be fooled, this is NOT a software engineering position. The HUB is a Tier 1 tech support job where you will spend your days restarting windows services and fielding customer complaints about the ineffectiveness of the software suite. You will in no way be engineering anything in this position, so It's beyond me why this is considered 'Software Engineering'. Simply dabbling in code and adding quick patches to VB6 code does not qualify as Software Engineering. Additionally, the technological foundation of the software is LIGHT YEARS behind the rest of the world. Management is so delusional that they fail to realize this and refuse to update the technology stack. I am currently interviewing at other companies (Which is tough, because potential employers laugh in my face when I tell them ProShip uses Visual Basic Script) But I can not wait to get out of this nightmare of a work environment. Undoubtably the largest downfall of ProShip Inc. is the Management, particularly in the support department. The management I encountered on a day-to-day basis is completely incompetent in every imaginable way. They do not have the technical expertise nor the managerial experience to adequately lead the departments. I am a firm believer in a 'lead by example' leadership methodology and it is my personal belief that a great manager should have the technical expertise to complete any task given to his/her employees, but you will not find this approach in the Support department. Please beware that recruiting will blatantly lie about the position in order to bolster recruitment. I was told in my interview that the company is fast paced and works hard between work hours, but you will not be bothered outside of work hours. Upon hire, I come to find out there is an on call list and they will consistently call you with support issues after hours, on weekends, even major holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas. If you do decide to work here, expect to sacrifice many weekends/ holidays fielding tech support calls. Please note that many of these calls occur at 2am. Please note that office politics are huge at proship. If you are not with the 'in' crowd, your job will become increasingly more difficult. This fosters double standards among employees at the same technical and organizational level. Compensation is way below industry standard and raises are very rarely issued. Upon hire, I had small incremental raises written into my contract, however, upon meeting those milestones the raises were not issued. I had to arm wrestle with upper management in order to issue said raises and 2 months after meeting one of the incremental milestones, one of the raises was finally issued. I can't image why they would make receiving my justified compensation such a nuisance to obtain. Aside from these built in raises, no additional increases have been issued despite countless promises otherwise. Overall, the current leadership has decreased the morale of the support department to an all time low, thus fostering a hostile work environment. There is no room for career growth at this company, and it is the very definition of a dead end job. Working for ProShip is a TRAP and I wouldn't recommend it to my greatest of enemies.
