Pros
— People: There are some great folks who work at PQ, and that makes the difference between packing up and leaving and sticking it out a while longer. — Time off / Pay: Could be better on the pay front, but all in all, solid pay for the work and excellent time off. — Atmosphere: You'd never know we're on a sinking ship; people are generally happy, and it's a fairly stress-free environment that makes it fun especially during group activities.
Cons
— HR: What HR? When I began working there, they promised regular meetings to discuss career paths, opportunities. That evaporated within the first six months. I don't think anyone working there could name two people that work in HR, let alone what they do for us besides put on middling parties around the holidays. There is a general malaise toward HR, an apathy run rampant throughout the company that they don't care about the employees. I rarely saw them do anything to challenge these notions in my time there. — Glut of senior management: While there are some good people in these positions, of course, overall, the company is saturated with Yes Men. It's become a bit of a joke, really. Someone announces a layoff (or, layoffs), and then two new vice presidents are announced a week later, their positions a mystery to the rest of us. (Senior VP of Southern Indiana Sales?) We never meet these people, and they rarely come in with fresh viewpoints. Instead, they want to please, not to leave their mark, and nothing actually changes. We get a lot of wind about changes coming, but they don't. They haven't in my nearly 5 years of experience. No one takes the time to really understand what the problems of the company are, or how they can actually be addressed. They come, they get better jobs, they leave, and the cycle repeats. And the best part: No one seems to care. This is a stopping point. If someone comes in with great viewpoints, with a desire to turn things around (and these people do exist), they're blocked by people who have no desire for these changes, for this hard work. And, eventually, their dreams of change die, too. — Blind devotion to the past / Stumbling toward the future: Having a company with a large population of employees who have worked there for 15/20+ years is...tough. Absolutely nothing against them, and good on them for keeping their positions for so long, but these people, generally, are not who management should be listening to...and yet they ARE who they listen to. Folks in the same position for decades don't generally have input into what could be done to cut through overly complex and antediluvian processes. Yet, that is who they want. Turnover sucks, but it's part of building a business up, which is what PQ claims they want. The best thing they could do would be to cut what isn't working, combine positions, make people reapply, and try to bring new, fresh blood in. A sweeping layoff is not what I'm saying, but adhering to the past simply to adhere to it is the cause of a great deal of woes in this company, and a reason why so many people leave. Take, for instance, a director who has been in the position for decades, who doesn't understand the technology their team works directly with, doesn't understand, really, what the future goals are, and sews discord because they believe senior leadership is coming for them. How is that a good environment? People get protective of their work, as they tend to be, but when aren't backing that up with results, with good leadership...it drives people away. There is no vision, there can't be, when people complain about how good it used to be, rather than ask how they can make it better. Which leads me to... — Mass migration of talent: Pretty simple, really...If you want to have a better company, you try to hold on to these talented new hires. Instead, PQ systematically makes it impossible to move around the company, offers almost nothing in the way of support, and is surprised when people with talent leave in droves for companies in the same city with a far better understanding of what it is employees want...how a company should treat them and grow. — Toxic everything: No exit interviews, no meetings to discuss future possibilities, internal politics like whoa, and middling (I mean middling) performances by upper management. Nuff said.
