As I said, my dream job has become a nightmare. I never expected that I would experience so much volatility during my first job- a time where I should be focusing on improving my skills, not caught up in worry over the latest drama. I've changed managers 4 times without ever changing teams, and hardly anyone is left from the original team I joined. I've seen first hand the way a toxic culture transforms people for the worse and breaks them down until they feel their only option is to leave.
It's the classic metaphor of a frog in a boiling pot of water- the transformation has been gradual enough that I can only look back and wonder how I ended up in a position where I'm upset all the time and apathetic about the future. There's so much to unpack, but to briefly summarize the cons:
- Extreme volatility and high turnover in certain departments (such as my own)
- Generally, HR exists to protect the company, not to support employees. I mostly felt that trying to improve things by engaging with my HRBP was a drain of time that could otherwise be spent improving my professional skills.
- Top down management style and toxic culture that hasn't changed significantly despite repeated employee complaints in my department
- High potential for burnout as the culture drains you mentally and emotionally
- Lack of developer autonomy when a decision is made unilaterally at the top
I know someone from the company is going to reply to this and encourage me to reach out to the employee experience team. I want to make it clear that I did in fact do that a while ago when it was suggested by my HRBP, and it was one of the most negative experiences I've ever had with an HR representative. It did not make me feel heard or improve my outlook.
Working with HR in general has not been helpful- even when one of my colleagues contacted our HRBP to say she was worried about how the team environment was impacting me, not a single person from HR reached out to check in on how I was doing. As much as I do believe that people have the capacity to grow and change, a corporation is not a person, and I am incredibly skeptical that these conditions will improve.