Pros
I learned a lot from experienced colleagues and had the chance to hone and practice technical retouching skills with a variety of clients.
Cons
Even though I'm grateful for the things I learned (because burying myself in the work was the only way I felt I could survive) and for a few of the nice connections I made, this was, overall, a pretty toxic work environment. No empowerment, poor leadership and uncomfortable, anxiety-inducing power dynamics made for a pretty unpleasant experience. The pay was way below average, there was always an excuse or reason for it to stay that way but there was never an issue hiring a wave of freelancers at 3-4 times the hourly wage. To add insult to injury, management dangled a carrot of training in a new skill but never actually followed through and instead, hired one specialist and "trained" only one employee in CGI from a different department in the company. It was really challenging to work here, and not in a good way. The majority of my time was spent with my nose down, immersed in the physical work to distract myself from the horror around me. Morale was always low, the supervisors always hot and cold, everyone was too eager to pass the buck and no one held management accountable. The young professionals left one by one when they realized they were on a burning, sinking ship and not a single thing was done to salvage the situation. There is no investment in young talent and no incentives (monetary, nor educational) for employees to stay. Truly, this was a very unhealthy place to work.