Avoid local offices, awful scheduling - Software Engineer II Garmin Employee Review

1.0
26 Dec 2014
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Imho all good reviews on glassdoor were mostly referring to HQ office in Kansas. Branch offices were quite different depending on your local projects and local management. Mine wasn't good. Often pressured us to meet unreasonable deadlines showing off to HQ. You can't work from home even you live far from office.

Cons

Lack of opportunities unless you are in Kansas. Garmin trying to evolve away from handheld gps device which has been its expertise for decades. Problem is years of inhouse driven development and lack of industry awareness in new approaches and new technoligies. Culture is very conservative and very "inside" the box thinking. New engineers leaving after about 2 to 3 yrs once they realize it takes an arm and leg to put this company on the right track. Scheduling is awful cuz garmin had been in its own domain for so long and lack of expertise in collaberating with other vendors. However it is good for intern and less experience engineers. After all they do have 20+ years of legacy code for you to learn.

Explore other reviews about Garmin

5.0
23 Jun 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Great work life balance Good people

Cons

Lower salary compared to market

3.0
3 Apr 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Good benefits and work life balance. It's a good culture and I've never worked at a place where your immediate peers are this helpful and pleasant to work with, even across teams and offices. If you want to just come in and do just what is required for your job and go home with the knowledge you have a stable job, this is the perfect place to work. I'd only recommend working here if you just want a job, but don't care about a career.

Cons

There is poor career advancement, especially if you aren't male. Leadership does not care about leading people. The RTO has made working here less appealing. The excuse that you can't collaborate unless you are in the same building makes no sense when you work with people in 6 different countries. It is about control and appearances, all due to incredibly poor senior leadership strategies. The pay is also low and so is the quality of the software you work on. Leadership likes to talk quality, but they like fast and cheap. They will not support you in actual software quality nor implement changes to improve it. The same issues happen over and over without improvement.

9
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