If you want to keep you sanity and health in check, please do not work for this company. - Anonymous employee IFF Employee Review

I cannot begin to even describe how poorly managed this company is. Though I haven't been working here for too long (compared to some people in the company), it shocks me that it is part of S&P 500 given their shambolic and unprofessional approach to their clients and how badly they treat their (particularly new) staff- witnessed it too many times and went through it myself when I first started out. I am also incredibly surprised not to see more negative reviews on glassdoor. Having spoken to a number of people from various parts of the world who work for the company (or worked in the past and left and never looked back), I assure you that the problems I am about to outline are consistent across the board. How this company has not yet gone bankrupt or collapsed is beyond me. At this pace, I think it really is only a matter of time. Very glad to be leaving soon,not sure how I managed to last at IFF for as long as I have. >>Politically charged environment, incredibly toxic atmosphere where people are only interested in winning the favor of their superiors and getting a pat on the head rather than doing what's best for the business. People talk about each other behind each other's back without any hesitation even if they were pretending to act friendly 5 minutes prior to that- childish behavior. Intimidating environment, tactics that verge on bullying, unfriendly people, extremely difficult to develop bonds and get to know people. I have never encountered a colder and more unpleasant environment over the course of my entire career. >>Awful business practices. Senior management encourage misleading clients. Keep seeing it more and more. >>Awful communication between departments. >>Extremely outdated technology, computers from the 90s/early 2000s, databases which were build for Windows '95/97, no heating in winter (had steam coming out of my mouth in the office in winter)/no aircon in the summer. Parsimonious management who are unwilling to invest or spend money on their employees. Long haul flights are always economy for example, god forbid you spend "too much money" on a last minute trip they've asked you to go on, once the company tried to avoid refunding me the full cost of the business trip by justifying how its "my own fault" that the tickets were expensive (they were not that expensive and it was a last minute trip)!! HR are useless as well. >>Nobody has any clearly defined roles. This should have been by far the biggest red flag when I went in for an interview with them. They could not even describe to me what I would be doing on a day to day bases. Had somebody told me that after getting this job I would be catering to different people's ridiculous whims and being asked to carry out illogical tasks, I would have thought twice about accepting their job offer. Speaking of illogical tasks... >>... I have two words for you. NO. TRAINING. I'm not exaggerating, there is no guidance or training provided to new members of staff. Scarily enough, IFF seem to almost take pride in that. Because of that, I've seen some very bright new people quit because they were on the verge of having a mental break down every day. Lack of training also leads to people spending years and years working at IFF without any knowledge of the basics, and when asked a question about it, often try to make things up because they are too scared to admit that they don't know the answer. All of this is of course done under the pretext of "Since we are such innovators, we really value proactive people" which in reality is a corporate euphemism for "We are not interested in explaining anything to anyone because" a)we don't understand it ourselves b)nobody trained me, why should anybody train you. **Never going to forget seeing a colleague who has a good 10-15 years of experience working for a different company in the industry in a very similar role, having a nervous break down because she was put under an insane amount of pressure within her first week and given no training whatsoever** Most people have been there for so long that they no longer remember what's it like to be new. You are simply expected to know all the endless intricate details of the business and day-to-day operations, and god forbid you ask a question because you will be openly called "stupid" (yes! that actually happened to me with one of my superiors- no joke. Should've walked out the same day looking back on it.) >>Senior management are (in the majority of cases) arrogant, incompetent and all have delusions of personal grandeur. For those who have seen "The Devil Wears Prada", think Meryl Streep's character, but much more irrational and far less impressive. If you are in the company long enough, you are pretty much guaranteed a cushy "manager" job after a few years regardless of whether you are qualified for it or not. Incredibly difficult people to work with who are also incapable of delegating even the simplest of tasks. Very disorganized too and because of their lack of essential life skills, they expect employees who are lower down the food chain to be picking up the pieces of their mess for them without ever accepting any personal responsibility. >>Personal responsibility simply does not exist within the company. Every employee regardless of how senior/not senior spends their day actively trying to shift their own responsibilities (often very minor! the kind that take less than 5 minutes to carry out e.g. sending an email enquiry to another department) onto other people. Therefore a simple task that takes 5 minutes gets passed around several different people until somebody gives in. Did you ever play hot potato when you were a child? Its a good metaphor for 'personal responsibility' at IFF.