Wasted Potential - Software Engineer White Widget Employee Review

This is an open plea to management, and some team members to please, at the very least, re-evaluate critically your next steps instead of being very reactionary without realizing the root cause of the issue. It is very alarming that despite the considerable number of people that have left recently and over the years that the same problems still persist and keep getting worse. Issues with Management and some Team Members (that got considerably worse as of late): 1. Unclear structure and vagueness of direction leads to very open interpretations and opportunity for management to gaslight or blame you. Even when pressed to give clear details, vague and at times contradictory answers are being given. Makes people wonder if this is in purpose so that responsibility will not be on management. Hence, some team members and management refuse to take proper ownership, only blaming others when problems arise later. This can be considered a pro in a way, since you are left no choice but to take ownership and level up your planning skills and take matters into your own hands; like many others who have left and found much better companies that appreciate them more ironically after learning this skill by force. 2. Unwillingness to admit fault and be transparent. Similar to lack of ownership, management and some team members only admit fault for the very trivial items, but rarely admit fault for the decisions that matter. Causing people to lose trust and be disillusioned by the false promises management (and the ones loyal to it) keep pushing. Most if not all that left would be okay if management had just been honest and clear; instead of trying to push their agenda by hiding it poorly behind remotely related and biased reasoning. 3. Internal development roadmap and growth in general is lacking if not non-existent. Management keeps pushing the team to upskill, without proper time allocation. Keeps pushing policies, without reviewing with the team if that's the best for the team's workflows. Keeps pushing AI, without understanding its limits and proper application. While a lot of potentially game changing workflows, tools, and plans just get wasted and shelved without proper support and discussion from the team. 4. Poor prioritization and overly dependent on being reactionary. Management has been very reactionary towards the direction of builds and projects. It has been a constant trend of panicking then blaming people, instead of actually sitting down and fixing the problem and evaluating what actually went wrong and what needs to be done. More time is wasted panicking, berating employees, and doing the wrong step instead of actually doing anything worthwhile at times. 5. Inability to maximize potential of employees. Lately, most of the employees are not being optimized and used by their strong suits. There are clearly more suitable engineers for specific fields, being assigned to do tasks that are well below their expertise. While some newcomers get assigned critical tasks that they may not be equipped to handle just yet. Furthermore, guidance is largely non-existent and has been confusing especially for newcomers lately. 6. Unreceptive to criticism and overly stubborn leadership. If you raise issues, even politely, management will take that as an attack immediately; when these are supposed to be for the good of everyone. Management and some team members always promote open discourse and feedback, but never really take these seriously and are sometimes illogically denying said suggestions, if not taking offense and resort to berating with senseless counterpoints. Does management even ask feedback of employees that have left recently? 7. Over reliance on AI for critical matters. This was not the case before, but more so lately management has been over reliant on using AI for decision making and generating critical work that it still cannot do properly. Please know the limitations and uses cases better. Integrate it where they serve best, do not let it fully control drafting responses, decision making, and presentations. 8. Unwillingness to relinquish control. To be fair, it is understandable the leadership is overwhelmed with an obscene amount of tasks. But the problem is leadership would not set aside time to train, guide, and trust people to delegate tasks to properly. Leadership should not be part of every meeting or every low level decision; yet insists to take part in it instead of trusting the competent team they've hired. Some of the exact pros mentioned above are also removed or downgraded as well: - Starting to reduce flexible work arrangements, even if the work can clearly and efficiently be done remotely. - Pay, while high initially, barely increases; some years without any increase at all. Lately management only increased pay for some as a reactionary panic to the people leaving. - Benefits are being retroactively changed without transparency lately. The limits and terms of said benefits are vague to begin with and hard to contest if they suddenly choose not to honor them by producing new reasons to exploit the unclear limits and terms. - Starting last year, management is persistently scheduling meetings on Friday nights that regularly overrun past work hours; even when management has been asked to move it earlier multiple times. Friday night activities regularly get cancelled or start too late these days. - Most of the people who would play office games, Friday activities and movies have already left due to most of the reasons above. - Office space for hanging out has been greatly limited when it was more open and accommodating before. - Yearly offsite activities are now heavily implied to be conditional, instead of the regular yearly team building schedule. Please just state your intentions to the team and the root of this idea instead of beating around the bush. Please realize, some have stayed in this company for years even though pay and opportunities offered by other companies would eclipse anything offered here past a junior role. Former employees have stayed because what the company stood for aligned with their principles and ideals for the longest time; but not anymore. On the other hand, for others who have left, do also understand that people wouldn't just leave suddenly into this chaotic and uncertain economic situation we currently live in, if not for a good reason. Is it still not terrifyingly clear to management that some would risk unemployment at this point, than even stay a moment longer in this company? Is it not overtly curious why no one who has left the company ever even thought of returning? Please infer logic and set aside pride for even just a moment: are the overwhelming number of evidences and feedback at this point not enough to realize there is a problem? This is a sincere hope that management starts listening and would be willing to confront the problems directly, before it is too late. It is already a terrible shame that the company has devolved to this point from its high peaks and former glory, and no one wants to see it fall further.