Salesforce

My first few months with Salesforce have been good. I've worked in the field for 10 years and been at companies ranging from large corporations to a small startup.

I read some of the one-star reviews and think people might have different experiences on different teams, or people just have different expectations.

As for my own experience, compared to the companies I worked for in the past, Salesforce is a good company to work for. It offers above-market salaries but also asks you to work hard for it.

No doubt the amount of things to learn at the beginning is overwhelming. Luckily, new employees are offered plenty of formal training classes.

Everyone on the team is ready to help, too. Because they have tons to do and really want you to be able to contribute.

The company is growing fast, so politics might get worse. But don't kid yourself. Wherever there are people, there is politics.

I once worked at a 50-employee startup and had to deal with the constant BS going on in the office. Find a good manager who can shield you from a lot of this if you are a technically minded person.

And the company allows you to jump between opportunities if you don't really like your current team and/or manager, and they can't hold you back. My previous job was at a large software company, where an internal transfer took at least a few months. An offer letter can take up to 6 months for it to go up the management chain and get a headcount. The quality of software was a mess because the management only cares about metrics and spreadsheets and has no idea what they were building.

So far, I haven't seen the same problems at Salesforce. The scrum teams are very small and agile. They do expect you to do real work very quickly, but working 10-12 hour shifts is not typical.

Lots to learn in the first 3-6 months; it's very hectic. The company is growing very fast, with some growing pains.

Cut the bureaucracy, keep focusing on the quality of the product.