Pluspunten
Smart and efficient program managers, government contract projects are cool, willing to hire people who may have a difficult time finding a job elsewhere due to their educational or personal background
Minpunten
I joined Idea Entity as a software engineer shortly after I finished my undergraduate education. The company stresses that they like to hire fresh college graduates because they learn quickly and their brains are easy to mold, but I’m pretty sure it’s because fresh college graduates are more willing to accept a low salary and abuse. The micromanagement is the worst part about working here. Here are 3 examples: 1) When I first joined Idea Entity (pre-COVID), I was given the option to work 9-5:30 or 9:30-6. After we started working remotely, there were 2 mandatory meetings scheduled per day for the tech team, 1 meeting at 9:30 AM and 1 meeting at 5 PM. Management noticed that some engineers and I were signing off at 5:30 PM and questioned us why. We said it’s because we started work at 9 AM. Management then rescheduled the morning meeting to 9 AM because they said they need to track what we are doing at 9-9:30 AM. Later, management rescheduled again to 8:45 AM, citing that they have a conflicting meeting at 9 AM. 2) Here is the daily schedule that we had to follow every day: Meeting at 8:45 AM. Send management a spreadsheet of the tasks we were planning to accomplish that day, broken into 2-hour time intervals. At every 2-hour interval, message management with updates of what we have done. Meeting at 5 PM. At the end of the work day, email the development team a daily status update of what we have accomplished for the day, with development/testing checklists attached. Missing any of these updates would result in a lecture from management, telling us that they needs to track everything that we are doing. 3) Management tried to ban engineers from using VSCode to edit code and make everyone use discontinued SharePoint Designer because they thought using VSCode will cause bugs. I believe choice of text editor should be a decision given to programmers. Turnover: Every couple of months, management will go on a firing spree and fire half of the development team with no warning. Management does not explain when asked why those people got fired, and how remaining employees can avoid the same fate. It seems to me like this practice will make everyone secretly apply for other jobs because they’re scared of getting fired. Work/Life Balance: Every week, you will be told “Sorry, but you need to work late into the evening today,” or “Sorry, but you need to work this weekend.” It started as a one-off request to work late until 12 midnight. Then, each week there would be at least 3 days where work would come up well after 8 PM. This includes weekends as well, and there is no compensation whatsoever. The closest thing to overtime pay is a half day off the next day, and it was only once. Expect to at least 60 hours/week here. Management: The engineering management team has poor technical knowledge. Most of your ideas will be shot down without any deep discussion or thought, just a rude insult of why it won’t work. Those who are struggling will be bullied and belittled by management instead of helped. The only managers that I’ve enjoyed working with are the program managers. There are no senior software developers on the US team to serve as mentors. Development: Extremely disorganized with no version control. Developers are frequently overwriting one another’s code and there is no standardized coding style. All you will do as a software engineer is boring JavaScript and boring SharePoint. There is no modern front-end framework used. This job position will not make you very remarkable in the job market. Certifications: Software engineers are told that they need to complete 4 mandatory Microsoft certifications (2 SharePoint, 1 HTML, 1 JS). To get each certification, you need to pay for and pass an exam. Idea Entity doesn’t provide any resources to help you pass the exams, and will only reimburse your exam fee if you pass it (LOL). The certifications are useless and you don't need them at all to do your job. COVID: After the COVID-19 pandemic started picking up, many tech companies implemented a work-from-home policy to protect their employees’ health. Not Idea Entity. Employees were told, “Sorry guys, but we are a small company and can’t afford for you to work remotely.” We only started working from home after it was legally mandated. I think Idea Entity probably saved money after their employees started working from home, since there’s less electricity being used. Benefits: 10 vacation days/year. Increases to 15 days/year after you’ve worked here for 2 years, then 20 days/year after you’ve worked here for 6 years. The handbook says you’re not allowed to take vacation until you’ve worked here for at least 6 months, but the manager will probably let you if you ask. 5 sick days/year. 10 federal holidays/year. You will not receive a home office stipend. You will get paid way below market salary when you first start working here, and then slightly below market salary after 1 year. TLDR: Some of the projects that I’ve worked on here are really cool, and many people, especially the handful of veterans, are amazing people to work with. However, many of the workplace practices here are extremely toxic and out-of-line with modern-day progressive values. Cons- Micromanagement, work lots of extra hours, unexciting technology stack, little vacation days, poor compensation P.S.: The employee handbook states that current employees of Idea Entity are not allowed to be job references to previous employees, so don’t bother trying to maintain relationships after you leave. Feel free to write a negative Glassdoor review like me!