Lots of fancy talk, and everyone is lost.
Arbeitsatmosphäre
For the colleagues working in Germany, the feeling is that we're just contractors who need to obey the orders from the UK. They constantly complain that we don't share the way we're working in Germany or "we're hiding here" but they do exactly the same. They hire new people and the new joiners don't know what to do or where to go and we need to "hunt" for pieces of information to help the new colleagues, decisions are made there and we just got informed after is done. Orders come from the top and need to be executed, doesn't matter if they're good or not, quite often those orders ignore the specialists in the area.
Kommunikation
On one hand, they have several meetings and channels to keep everyone informed about results and numbers. On the other hand, when it comes to a more granular approach, how the teams can work, what would be the deliverables the communication is often broken. Few PMs manage to have a very problem-solver approach and really organize things. Quite often you have to figure things out by yourself.
Kollegenzusammenhalt
I had a great time with my colleagues from Cluno and a few from Cazoo.
Work-Life-Balance
No complaints here, if you need time to go to a doctor or simply a break there's no question asked.
Vorgesetztenverhalten
Managers at Cazoo seem only titles. They never have answers. They mistake "having ownership of a project" with "do it all by yourself without any guidance". I approached my manager to ask about goals and next steps, and they never had a clear answer, and this situation last for months. Often they told us to "start something", very vague and it looks to me that they're asking me to do something just to "look busy".
Whenever you manage to engage in some task, some managers acts as a blocker micromanaging you or over-engineering the problem, so only they can solve it. I informed my superiors several times about the situation and lack of proper management, but I only got vague answers and taps on my backs. Despite that, they still show in general meetings lots of slides with fancy and complicated words to solve the problems of management, but so far nothing really happened (since February 2021).
Interessante Aufgaben
Cazoo talks a lot about teamwork, but sometimes you can see people who don't want your help just to have all the credits. Isn't explicit, but the way they behave to you, blocking you, making things over-complicated almost like to make you quit. And sometimes this "one-person show" ends up blocking a whole team or project. Sadly in almost one year at cazoo, I have nothing that I'm proud to show.
Arbeitsbedingungen
Munich office is awesome. Very large, bright, comfortable. There's a big kitchen with good drinks and coffee. The terrasse is the best part of the office.
Gehalt/Sozialleistungen
Before you start you need to have an ideal salary in mind because you're going to stick with this salary for a very long time. Cluno and Cazoo had feedback sessions and talks about careers, but I never saw the promotion I was begging for (for a lack of a better word) for several months. And once Cazoo happened, they simply change my position (not a promotion) to something that I would have to start the "hunt for promotion" all over again without asking me.
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Out there Cazoo is huge and is growing hyper-fast. Conquering Europe. Inside we only see a company throwing money and people into the problems, with the only goal being GROWTH. Doesn't matter how. You don't feel like being part of something big, I just fell like I'm feeding coal to a giant locomotive together with 3000 people.
Karriere/Weiterbildung
As I mentioned on the salary topic, career progression is very slow here. I spend a few years receiving good feedbacks and taps on my back, but never got the promotion itself. I had indeed a salary adjustment, but in the words of my manager "that was just a correction, the promotion will come" and never came.