Pros
The technical work was genuinely interesting, and my colleagues were competent and knew what they were doing.
Cons
- I worked every weekend, often for entire days, without ever being explicity told to, because the workload effectively demanded it.
- Messages regularly came in late at night, including around 11 PM, as if it were normal working hours, and it became clear that not responding was viewed negatively.
- My vacation time was rarely real rest since I would still be contacted or return to urgent issues that made me feel obligated to stay engaged.
- There was an unspoken expectation of constant availability, where being ready to respond immediately was treated as standard.
- I became exhausted from constantly checking my phone first thing in the morning and right before sleeping because work never truly stopped.