Ford

Very little oversight, little micromanaging. Often, there is not much work to be done.

Management (higher-up execs) make ridiculous decisions. The most recent layoffs were not based on performance. We know multiple people were laid off with great reviews and people were spared who had bad ones. Best we can guess is they picked random people they thought made too much money. They know nothing about programming. Their code is awful, and this seems to be because they think software engineers are overpaid, so they try to pay as low as possible. I am only well-paid because my old company acquired me. Higher-ups make awful decisions, and managers openly admit they are bad decisions, but it is what it is. Also, their return-to-office mandate is silly. I'm convinced they're using ChatGPT to come up with ideas and mandates. They seem to think there are thousands of people not showing up to work when they are mislabeled in their own system.

I truly don't know if this company can be redeemed.

Treat software engineers as the professionals they are and stop making decisions like a software engineer is manufacturing. It is not.

Your platforms are failing, and that is why, not because you have lazy workers.