Toxic - Engineer Footprint Employee Review

Toxicity: In short, toxicity is acceptable at Footprint. And the attrition rate of the CORPORATE side tells the story in being around 30%. On the production side the attrition rate is above 50%. Because the turnover is so high, the toxic people are allowed to stay. There literally is a fair amount of people who won't attend certain meetings due to the atmosphere that will undoubtedly be present due to certain people attending. The way the corporate side treats the production side (ya know, the people doing the physical work) is sad. Just to put all this in another light - about half the people I know that left from the corporate side left before they even had a job lined up. It was literally better to leave and have no job than to stay and endure. Expectations: I interviewed and no mention was made of on-call or travel. None! Yet, people are on call 24/7 and multiple people travel to Mexico so often they might need to buy a second house down there. Many areas are using one engineer with no backup so it is all up to that one person. What happens when that person leaves? This is all to go along with no training. Nobody gets even the most basic training such as where the procedures are located (which you are expected to abide by). Work-life balance: As mentioned above, on-call 24/7 and travel is expected. Neither which was mentioned in my interview process. I routinely hear management say to people they need to come in early and are then asked (in same day) to stay late. And this is not a once-off... this is the norm. This should not be the answer - the answer should be for managers to understand why we are missing data/information and remove that roadblock. But the sad truth is that if management can find someone to work long hours then why try to truly solve the issue? Meetings on the weekend just to update a table that can be updated on Monday? C'mon! Site-directive: We are absolutely hounded to get numbers. Every day meetings start out with out output. OK, yes, output sucks. But if the answer is always to get better output numbers but you don't afford engineers to do experiments to try to see if they can make those numbers better then Footprint will always be in the "band-aid mode" instead of the longevity mode. Do you want the machine up running like crap or do you want engineers to work on long-term solutions (which means you don't get your numbers). From an engineering standpoint I feel like all decisions are based off of theoretical models from finance - not engineering testing saying this plan is physically/procedurally viable long-term. Testing and "upgrades" are just tossed onto machines without any implementation or containment plans - just someone said it'd make the machine faster/better when the reality it makes the situation more convoluted at best and downright damages the process at worst. In engineer speak - there is no control board to control the changes and understand the impacts of anything we do at Footprint. Are we a technology development site or a high-volume site. Make up your mind. Recognition: This goes along with the toxicity. There are times when people need to be told hard truths and be "scolded." However, there is a ratio of praise-to-criticism. At the bare minimum it should be 5:1, with some sources saying it should be something much higher. At Footprint I'd honestly guess it is closer to 1:10! There is no lateral recognition or kudos and no top-down recognition. And if there is top-down recognition then it absolutely seems trite and forced. And if you want to hear your managers-manager or the C-suite give you or your group a thumbs up you'll be waiting for a long time. Generally speaking there is no token appreciation - and if you do get something like a lunch provided for you it is given to everyone - not you specifically for YOUR good job. Which in my mind defeats the purpose of management knowing specifically the hard work each person is putting in. Safety: Safety is an afterthought. I've never felt more in danger than I do at Footprint. And when it comes down to getting proper gear it seems like pulling teeth. Do we or do we not care about getting people the proper gear? Set-up: You are truly thrown to the wolves when you start here. No training. No computer. No access to the folders you need. No computer hardware. No phone directory (who the heck do I need to call when I have no numbers and know nobody). No work phone. No computer programs that are needed for your job role (the IT department is garbage as you need them for anything computer related but they are never present and seemingly have no concern for helping you - literally have to visit their desk for a straight week hoping they are there). Ridiculous. Organization: There is none. I've never been in a more chaotic work environment. This goes hand-in-hand with the site-directive point above - it was painfully obvious that from an engineering standpoint that they were far more interested in building a portfolio than doing actual engineering. Get those customers - be damned if we understand the process or the failures. Which brings me to my last point... Future: The underlying feeling I got when working there was that once the company goes public the C-suite will sell out immediately. If you have a lot of "customers" then your company appears to be more valuable and you can sell for more money. I'll be very surprised if the owners don't sell when they go public.