Autodesk

This applies to the ex-Delcam office in Birmingham as of April 2016.

• Friendly people, on the most part.
• Interesting work, some of the time.
• Excellent working hours. I work an 8-hour day and from home on a Friday.

Generally, all three of these are getting worse as the Autodesk takeover gathers speed.

This applies to the ex-Delcam office in Birmingham as of April 2016.

• Terrible communication.
• Poor senior management, though in fairness, they aren't helped by the cliquey, siloed, and poorly-structured workings of our Autodesk parent company.
• Salary and benefits are low for the Birmingham area, which is noticeable considering the bulk of engineers here have Masters and PhDs from Russell Group universities.

A lot of Delcam is explained by its history. One of the many CADCAM companies to start around the 60s and 70s (Autodesk, now our parent company, started about that time), it was originally a research group based out of Cambridge. Now it's a much larger company based out of Birmingham. The original founders have left, but the first generation haven't. The result is a very close-knit, family feel at the top, but not much room for movement otherwise. Throw in Autodesk, an aggressive, fast-moving company with a poor track record for integrating acquisitions, and you can imagine where Delcam is now.

Do not, I repeat, do not come to work for this company.

This applies to the ex-Delcam office in Birmingham as of April 2016.

Communicate:

Improve salary and promotion prospects. Good developers who came to work for a friendly company and could put up with the poor salaries aren't staying now that they only have the poor salaries.

Don't employ ex-engineers as managers unless they are capable and you are willing to train them.