Workday

Over my years at Workday, I met some of the greatest people.

There were people that I met on my original team that I was in contact with through my entire career and even now.

Almost every team and IC I had interacted with were willing to answer questions, send training materials, or help solve a problem.

Although Workday used to be a culture of collaboration and fun, it quickly became internal politics and horrible decisions from above. Starting about six years ago, there were reorganizations after reorganizations.

They move around and replace management at least every year, so a lot of ICs have to start the process to promotion over again. They also constantly changed the review process, move the goalposts for promotions, and some managers just refuse to advocate for you despite saying that you are on the right track.

Raises are practically unheard of unless they're cost-of-living adjustments. They pretend to champion VIBE and other diversity initiatives but never respond to feedback or follow up on them. They make their EBCs do all the work with very little support from their Diversity team and break promises.

Since last year, there's been a large shift in C-Suites where people are seemingly jumping ship. They've been silently and publicly laying off people around the same time, and hardly any of their engineering job postings are in Pleasanton despite a lot of the teams being located there. Yet they want everyone to work in the office 50% of the time, even if your team is in a completely different office.

Be honest and transparent with employees about all of the changes. Create new core values, since Employees, Integrity, and Fun are obviously not at the forefront of your mind any more. Focus on making more stable management and team structures, treating your employees like the adults they are, and rewarding the top workers.