Nepo company: everyone is already linked and has worked together for years which means that new people coming in are not well integrated and communication is poor. For example, I was told I could have a development plan by HR, it never materialised. I was told the dress code was casual by one and smart casual by another. No one had time or wanted to take the time to help or bring me into the fold.
Bad manager: the manager made my colleague cry twice in the early days, didn't know what we were working on, banned us from asking another colleague for help, made assumptions about things without speaking to me directly which generally made me anxious. Expectations were not made very clear. Was told to 'step up' but no detail was given. When I said I was struggling and asked for support they did not provide it.
Not very diverse: there was a particular occasion where there were some racial comments made in the corporate chat which I don't think would have been made if the team was more diverse. Generally didn't feel like a space that is welcoming to a diverse workforce - this is made worse by the fact it is a nepo company and it can feel hard to integrate in general. No one is directly malicious or racist at all but standards of banter are unclear and there is definitely a double standard (again probably because no one wants to HR their mate).
Poor training: after the 3 week induction, it was pretty unclear what was going on. We were told we would assist people on writing bids... for me, that never happened. The first bid (and only bid in 9 months!) I wrote had about a week turn around, I was put in my first SME call by myself with no prep. Luckily the client was happy with the final product but my manager still gave me negative feedback!
