26 May 2021
BMW Car IT Senior Software Engineer reviews
3.2
53% would recommend to a friend
Chris Brandt
Not enough data to show CEO approval
74% positive business outlook
Reviews by job title
5 reviews
3.0
31 Jul 2020
Good if you love cars, intransparent and frustrating management/organization
Current employee
Ulm, Baden-Wurttemberg
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook
Pros
- Nice colleagues - Very open and international - Obvious automotive benefits: Hands-on experience with cars and driving trainings, plus okay company car model - Some interesting technologies and projects - Good flexibility regarding working times and home office - Pay is not bad for the area - Free coffee and fruit baskets - Good if you have a family and want to take it slow
Cons
- Intransparent communication from management. Information like team structure changes and personal departures are often only communicated shortly before becoming active, although they have been decided long before - Lots of politics, with many Yes Men in lower leadership roles, very shy of taking responsibility - Slow progress in organizational, management and project topics: lots of announcements and updates, with realization often taking years - Very long time-frames for product/project development - new projects often are started years before planned public release - Agile working mode is often not really achieved: scrum master role is generally not filled, plus the long term waterfall planning and project structuring on the AG side limits the agility often - Bad processes, tooling and BMW-specific technology in a lot of places. This makes many basic tasks and integration very difficult, and the problems always have to be solved inside the teams, leading to lots of home-brewing and "not-invented-here" solutions - Lots of buerocracy, on all levels - Many demotivated, less talented colleagues especially on the AG side - Not a lot of autonomy in the bigger picture, the big decisions are all made inside the AG in Munich. - Post mortems or lessions learned generally seem to be avoided, leading to lots of churn and the same mistakes being repeated constantly - Weird and annoying Ulm-site rules like "last two people in one office wing have to leave together" - Many qualified people seem to leave after not too long - Management of external contractors can quickly become a big part of your job as a developer, depending on the project - Worse compensation and contract conditions than equivalent roles in the AG - No works council, no "Tarifvertrag", no 35 hour week - Very limited bonus system
5.0
6 Mar 2019
Challenging and rewarding environment
Current employee, more than 3 years
Ulm, Baden-Wurttemberg
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook
Pros
- Elaborate performance review process: Line managers spend a lot of time to discuss the performance of every employee and write a multi-page "portfolio" document. Salary increases are based on a number of criteria such as ability to cope with change, knowledge and reputation, and dialogue and rated according to the current "competence" level of the employee. This provides great feedback to grow not only regarding technical skills, but also personally. - Since the company started comparing salaries with those in the overall software industry, salaries have become more competitive, especially taking into account that (unlike in some other companies) nobody is expected to work more than the contractual hours. - Compliance is handled very well. I have not seen any signs of that kind of culture that seems to be widespread at other car-makers which have made headlines in recent years. - Associates are kept well-informed about all issues affecting the company, such as the yearly strategy definitions, strategically important projects, or regular updates on the progress on internal change projects related to the company strategies, using formats such as an all-hands meeting (three times yearly, including an annual networking event with some teambuilding games or video-streamed presentations). Contributing to the implementation of the strategy (as a side activity in addition to the main "revenue" project) is encouraged. - Training is encouraged, both on technical topics and on soft skills. There is a credit system allowing up to 10 training days per year (for in-house trainings, less for external trainings or conferences). Of course, own initiative is required to use this. - In general, the company culture is open and appreciative. Employees are highly skilled. Of course, your mileage may vary from team to team.
Cons
- BMW GROUP is not a software organization. This means many processes will appear overly bureaucratic to software engineers. - Establishing innovation often requires a large amount of patience.
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