Pros
- Most staff were nice.
- Good work life balance, there can be the expectation of overtime but this is rare and is not really enforced due to low client volume. Management is open to WFH arrangements, London staff were offered 1-day WFH a week and if you need to request more these requests are rarely denied.
- Low oversight from management meant staff had the ability to enact necessary change, although this has largely gone away.
- Very easy to get senior and leadership experience, although this is due to a lack of leadership.
Cons
- Inexperienced staff. The majority of developers are hired as graduates, which means there is very little senior-level mentorship or experienced staff to guide projects or onboard new staff. When employees leave, knowledge gaps persist because replacements are often also junior hires. Staff are given no formal training of any kind.
- Poor office and equipment. The layout of the office means there is little natural light in certain areas, and broken or flickering lights often went unrepaired for months, causing eye strain. Staff are issued outdated, low-quality, or damaged equipment: PCs frequently struggle to build or run the software, keyboards and chairs are often broken or missing parts, and monitors are old and lack eye protection. Although minor, these conditions negatively impact both productivity and staff well-being.
- Significant tech debt. The tech stack is significantly outdated, with most software being at least 10-20 years old and poor decisions made decades ago continue to impact work on many projects. There is no investment in modernization or QA and only minimal automated testing. Lack of documented use cases makes refactoring very difficult and risky, which slows down progress.
- Poor Human Resources. Multiple complaints about bullying and abusive behaviour were ignored, creating a culture where staff felt raising concerns was not worthwhile. Instead of addressing problems head on as they arise HR often ignored problematic behaviour with the hopes that issues will resolve themselves. This enabled toxic behaviour to continue and fostered negativity between staff and a culture where staff are not treated as adults.
- Poor management. Teams are expected to self-manage despite having little management experience and no training, which leads to inefficiency and lack of accountability. Developers work the same task for months, making little or no progress, without review or oversight. The absence of a clear decision-making process often results in deadlocks, creating conflict within teams. Management and sales promise potential clients features that don’t exist, without consulting developers, and expect developers to build them on extremely tight timelines.
- No vision. The company lacks a long-term vision or product strategy, instead work is driven by chasing individual (potential) client demands, and features are built for clients without contracts or any market research. This reactive approach leads to frequent shifts in direction, increases tech debt, pressures teams, and is demotivating for staff who may invest significant time into features that go unused.
- Poor benefits and pay. Most staff are hired on near or minimum wage; salary progression can be reasonable but there is no formal promotion structure, so employees are expected to take on senior responsibilities without a corresponding increase in pay, this issue is exacerbated by hiring policies and a high turnover rate. Non-salary benefits are the legal minimum and requests for even improved benefits that would cost the company money are met with resistance. Combined with the other issues, this has led to a very high turnover rate.