Letter to a Friend
I was asked about the culture at The Employer. My response,
Even with my complaints about The Employer's culture, I can say there is no established caste system; though I would also have to say that there are perhaps airs of a caste system forming over time as more senior engineers steadily gain more say. The Employer today is not The Employer I joined : there are budgets, specific headcount requisitions by team/office, and there's healthy food in the kitchenettes. As an internal meme recently put it: "My manager's manager's manager's manager reorganized his direct reports - he say's it's going to be just like a startup!" Things feel more centralized, more top down. But, HUGE-CAVEAT: I'm in Boston, and it's hard to tell which aspects reflect that and which reflect general corporate aging. Still, The Employer isn't Narnia. Managers can still feel like managers; management decisions can still fuck projects. Another meme (aren't memes great? albeit better when said by cute cats an' such) runs, "There are two ways to do things: the way that's been deprecated and the way that doesn't work yet." (Somebody pointed out one API that is deprecated AND still in development.)
But, it's still THE EMPLOYER. Being at The Employer still means working on potentially very cool shit (PopularProjectA, PopularProjectB, PopularProjectC, SecretProjectX, SecretProjectZ, &c.), with collections of odd perks, competitive compensation, and great coworkers. That can not be emphasized enough: great coworkers. It's like everybody I interact with is really bright, has a solid work ethic, and a collection of sometimes-nifty social quirks. Most important, when somebody disagrees with you they almost always have thought about it and are able to present reasons. Is everybody awesome? No, but the majority are. The offices tend to be snazzy and feel pretty open, though sometimes a touch crowded, with lots of leeway for decoration and expression. CEO-guy once said the dress code was simple: !naked You're still encouraged to speak to power, though it feels more career-risky to do so than it used to be. There is still space for day-job-disjoint-side-project projects, but they require more justification than they used to.
The core mood of pacing and expectations can vary a lot from office to office and even team to team, so it's hard to make generalities about day-to-days. And, of course, I really only have the perspective of a software engineer augmented by observation and occasional conversations, so, take all this with a pile of salt.
Sometimes I get frustrated and think I'd like to leave, but then, I can't think of where I could go that'd be a net win without potential of a significant downside loss along oh-so-many vectors.
Even with my complaints about The Employer's culture, I can say there is no established caste system; though I would also have to say that there are perhaps airs of a caste system forming over time as more senior engineers steadily gain more say. The Employer today is not The Employer I joined : there are budgets, specific headcount requisitions by team/office, and there's healthy food in the kitchenettes. As an internal meme recently put it: "My manager's manager's manager's manager reorganized his direct reports - he say's it's going to be just like a startup!" Things feel more centralized, more top down. But, HUGE-CAVEAT: I'm in Boston, and it's hard to tell which aspects reflect that and which reflect general corporate aging. Still, The Employer isn't Narnia. Managers can still feel like managers; management decisions can still fuck projects. Another meme (aren't memes great? albeit better when said by cute cats an' such) runs, "There are two ways to do things: the way that's been deprecated and the way that doesn't work yet." (Somebody pointed out one API that is deprecated AND still in development.)
But, it's still THE EMPLOYER. Being at The Employer still means working on potentially very cool shit (PopularProjectA, PopularProjectB, PopularProjectC, SecretProjectX, SecretProjectZ, &c.), with collections of odd perks, competitive compensation, and great coworkers. That can not be emphasized enough: great coworkers. It's like everybody I interact with is really bright, has a solid work ethic, and a collection of sometimes-nifty social quirks. Most important, when somebody disagrees with you they almost always have thought about it and are able to present reasons. Is everybody awesome? No, but the majority are. The offices tend to be snazzy and feel pretty open, though sometimes a touch crowded, with lots of leeway for decoration and expression. CEO-guy once said the dress code was simple: !naked You're still encouraged to speak to power, though it feels more career-risky to do so than it used to be. There is still space for day-job-disjoint-side-project projects, but they require more justification than they used to.
The core mood of pacing and expectations can vary a lot from office to office and even team to team, so it's hard to make generalities about day-to-days. And, of course, I really only have the perspective of a software engineer augmented by observation and occasional conversations, so, take all this with a pile of salt.
Sometimes I get frustrated and think I'd like to leave, but then, I can't think of where I could go that'd be a net win without potential of a significant downside loss along oh-so-many vectors.