Wise

As an experienced engineer, Wise has a decent technology stack, and the product offering is strong across the globe. There is a good bunch of people and some really good perks, such as Friday lunches and a yearly paid 3-day party.

On the work itself, colleagues are usually supportive. Should you be in a good team, there can be good opportunities to advance one's career by being exposed to interesting problems around scaling a startup business.

To start with, you work for a company that has little consideration for your well-being. You're constantly overworked with expectations way beyond a 40-hour week. You're being asked directly that you have to put in hours beyond your 9 AM to 6 PM. Yes, you read right; you're being asked to do this directly by your manager.

The self-organized autonomous teams mean that there's a poor overall system design where teams are strongly dependent on each other. There's no unified planning method, so planning across squads is effectively impossible, and this has also created a highly selfish culture.

You're being constantly micromanaged. Your lead will have a spreadsheet with every task you do and a tick box next to it; every second counts. You may think this is an exaggeration, but please read the rest of the reviews about micromanagement. I overlooked them prior to joining Wise.

A completely misunderstood feedback culture. Feedback culture means that on every mistake or oversight, you're going to receive feedback. It also means that there's constant fear about receiving bad feedback, and you constantly watch your back.

Lastly, you may have received an offer and you're looking at these reviews to make up your mind. The offer is good, and you're considering joining. Pension is a joke at 5%, and the rest of the package is poor compared to other fintechs.

Create leaders, not micro-managers.