Pros
It's a great place to work if you like politics and the old-school of doing this, like: project oriented development, a lot of bureaucracy to get things done and lack of agility.
Cons
I have been working at Farfetch for many years. I'm not working at Farfetch anymore. My feedback is based on my personal experience on the technology department. Organizational Structure and Process: Farfetch has a lot of bureaucracy and too many managers, which can slow down decision-making and create unnecessary redundancies. The company also tends to be slow and lacks agility, making it difficult to keep up with the fast pace of the industry. In addition, there are often too many meetings between middle management, which can be time-consuming and unproductive. Furthermore, top-down decisions are made without sufficient consultation with those who will be implementing them, leaving middle management to communicate changes to their teams and deal with the resulting complaints. Technology and Product Development: Farfetch has some old-school employees who are not up-to-date with the latest technologies and ways of doing things. This can create a disconnect between architecture/product teams and the engineering team, leading to difficulties in communication and collaboration. Additionally, there is a heavy emphasis on estimation, and many projects never get started. While there is a lot of work in progress, only a small percentage of it is actually delivered, and many initiatives are not well-thought-out and do not solve real customer problems. At Farfetch, middle management is often bogged down by endless meetings between themselves, the architecture team, and the product team. Unfortunately, the main focus of these meetings tends to be on estimation and scope reduction for delayed projects, which can make it difficult to achieve meaningful progress. Some employees are also old-school and not up-to-date with the latest technologies and approaches, which can impede progress. The architecture team is led with arrogance and is completely disconnected from the reality of the teams. Despite their inflated sense of importance, they lack understanding of the day-to-day operations of the company. Similarly, the product team is largely focused on discussing features that will never be implemented and engages in discussions with a great lack of context. They have even removed product people from the team's daily activities, supposedly to focus more on handling stakeholders and thinking about the "future," which seems entirely illogical. The architecture and product teams both suffer from a lack of accountability and effectiveness in executing on their responsibilities. Company Culture: There is a lot of politics at Farfetch, which can be frustrating to deal with. The architecture team can also be disconnected from reality and struggle to communicate effectively with other departments. The company tends to prioritize getting things done on time over quality, even if this means reducing scope or impacting the customer experience. Additionally, the business case estimations are often unrealistic, and many features are valued in the millions of dollars without any validation afterward. The culture at Farfetch can be quite political, with a lot of "cover-my-ass" work where the main goal is to shine and get promoted. Many employees have realized that promotions are based on the number of team members under them, which has led to a focus on increasing team size rather than on delivering quality and impactful work. Unfortunately, some individuals with experience in political environments have learned how to gamify KPIs, metrics, and their work to present themselves as doing a better job than they actually are. The executive board at Farfetch is highly focused on outputs rather than outcomes, which can lead to a lack of strategic direction and vision. They are also quite micromanaging, which can be demotivating for employees.
