Hand to mouth existence, very large leadership team- "too many chiefs, not enough Indians"
heritage as a mining focused company continues
Founder is now sole driver- what he wants/ thinks goes. Sometimes good, often not, rarely well thought out
One of the most charismatic and ambitious Managing Directors you will meet! Very inspirational and motivating style of leadership. Great people values across the company, almost to the point where it can be sometimes detrimental to the firm (i.e. carrying underperformers who shouldn't be there and wouldn't make it in other firms).
As it's a smaller firm you tend to get exposure to all parts of projects as well as the internal business (recruitment, marketing, BD). No problems with being given trust, autonomy, responsibility etc.
Highly intelligent people working there and great if you can get access to them which usually isn't a problem.
Great company culture.
Cons
Small company problems:
- Internal systems are either limited or clunky
- Formal training is rare
- When things go quiet, budgets get cut!
- Brilliant, talented and motivated people
- Working with senior team members including directors and the MD from the get go
- Access to client senior management team
- Responsibility from the beginning
- Good salary
- Work/life balance in the field is unparallelled
- Going through a strong growth period
Cons
- Often staffed ona FIFO project. Fly to client site in rural area on Monday, fly back to be in the office on Friday. This gets tiring.
- Small company so you pretty much always know who you'll be working with
- Systems need to be better designed and communicated. Things like leave, expense policies and training aren't at all standardised
- Steep learning curve