Altagram 

GmbH

Unternehmenskultur

The team members were great, but the overall work atmosphere was stressful and with a lot of pressure from above. There was not enough software licenses and equipment for everybody and organisation was chaotic towards nonexistent. Deadlines were always very very tight and overtime as well as crunchtime omnipresent.
Management didn‘t care about the employees and had no idea how to lead people.

Communication was very bad, because important information about work processes, changes in the company etc. where not relayed or where relayed wrongly. Oftentimes plans were changed, but this was not relayed to the team and when you asked someone about it, it was ridiculed that you were even thinking the first way had ever been approached.
Changes were also most of the times only announced shortterm, so you always had little time to prepare for it and had to adjust quickly.

Generally good, but the anonymous „surveys“ the company asked you to fill out about colleagues lead to not openly discussed problems which are just „tattled“ to the management without you ever being told that someone had a problem with you, so no chance for you to address the problem or work it out with the person in question. Talking behind ones back was that way supported by the management.
Also the company always talked about how important team spirit is for them, but nurtured an environment of competition between employees, by openly comparing the performance of employees, randomly (by a raffle) only rewarding some employees for the pronounced work of all and by the above mentioned anonymous „surveys“.
Some colleagues also didn’t know how to address problems in a polite and professional way, if they did so openly to begin with.

Home office was possible, but work times were very inflexible and overtime and crunchtimes ever-present. You couldn‘t structure your work for the day on your own, because deadlines weren‘t „end of day“ but at specific times of the day. Big projects were announced earlier (meaning 2-3 weeks before work started), but smaller ones mostly didn‘t get much notice (1-3 days most of the time, but also often short-notice „can you squeeze this in today?“).
In theory you could say „no, can‘t do it“, but then maybe your „utilization rate“ would suffer, so everybody always tried to do the macimum workload they could shoulder, no matter if they were ill, stressed or over-worked already.
Vacation time was not a lot when you started and improved only over years of work for the company.

Management and leads didn’t have any leading competence. Most of the time they weren’t able to help you out with your problems, sometimes not even addressing that there were problems at all.
Management was not interested in their employees, only in the work they could do.
Professional feedback about the work was not considered at all, because the head of the company always thought she knew best, even if others in management who were the experts for the matter told her differently. Sometimes stupid work processes were instilled only to „prove to her that they don‘t work“, which everybody besides her already knew.
Also I sometimes had the impression that personal gain was taken from the head of the company at the expense of the company and its employees.

The work itself was diverse and fun, some projects more than others like everywhere. But sadly the overall working experience destroyed every joy I might have otherwise taken from work.
Quantity of work done was always more important than quality.