Pros
-Only larger scale high-tech company in the Carson Valley -Great outdoors activities
Cons
I love this business. I was there for over 35 years, before recent layoffs, with a great severance package and speeding up my retirement plan only by few months - so I'm very happy. Looking at this business, in the last 10 or so years, I'm sad to share that it has gotten far worse than ever before. It's clear that the business leaders have been progressively drifting away of what made this business great. Founders had the secret recipe of creating a business that's customer-focused, quality driven, and empowered employees. If I didn't know better, I'd think someone is going out of their way to jeopardize this business!!! Current business leader exhibits zero empathy, sympathy or inclusiveness. Frequently, she'd say things like "Layoffs are all about the business not about the people"; this tells all employees that they don't matter, and they're not appreciated and what they bring to the table is inferior! good leaders would never say this even if it were true. Her biggest achievement for the last year is scolding emails, though decorated with superficial "Thank yous.” These emails are focused on creating walls between leadership and employees; conference rooms that we were always used to host guests proudly, are now exclusively used for her and her team - resulting in less than 10% of time utilization. Only her conference room (next to her office, accessible by few only) can be used for food and drink - all other conference rooms that have historically been used for Lunch and learns and other essential activities are banned from food and drink services. This business leader has not taken the time to get to know the major contributors to the business, outside of her own team. Her decision to fly her team for 1/2 hour one-on-one (easily achievable via Teams), business class travel I'm sure, yet deny critical technology coach travel due to cost speaks volumes. Other “great” decisions she's made are closing of the on-site clinic, laying off nurse practitioner, halting all outdoors equipment rentals.... These are all things that have been extremely helpful for employees and attracting new talents. Finally, her appearance to care about the quality of the products fades through her decisions that focus on shipping and numbers. Technology leader does not understand the US culture, at all! he expects you to take a laptop when you're on vacation and be on standby, though alternates and other contingencies are in place for business continuity. Rather than encouraging the employees to relax, recharge and come back for another round of great work, his actions make you feel guilty to take any time off. He, single-handedly, drove the closure of a Shanghai facility with highly skilled engineers that have been strong contributors for over 15 years, only to beef up the team in his homeland, India. Though he was shown, by numbers, that Shanghai office was comparable on cost, better turnover, major contributor to quality work, and far better skilled technologists, he insisted to create work opportunities in his home country - regardless of the negative impact on the overall business. His communication skills and responsiveness are far below what's expected of a sr. executive leader. His appreciation of the team is almost non-existent, and respect for people's time, schedules and life-work balance are disappointing, to put it kindly; he's late for almost all his meetings (with his reports, on-time when bosses are invited), zero transparency on decision making and his idea of inclusivity is an extravagant team Christmas dinner. What's very critical "today" is not that important tomorrow. He’s frustrating to work with as he's extremely moody and unpredictable. Disengaged with his team, and great at managing-up (appearing to boss as ideal, thoughtful and respectful - far from reality) Supply chain, HR and pretty much all departments are going downhill. Focus on making numbers is evident, and those who have the courage to speak up and drive for quality rather than profit are labeled as “not team players”, “negative”, and some have even been laid off. Reporting structures and re-organization also show a business that is not designed to focus on doing what’s right or speaking up; Quality is reporting to supply chain leader, for example, resulting in Quality team pushing for getting products out the door and appeasing the leader, rather than stopping the line and doing what’s right.