Exciting Vision ruined by Infighting, Politics & Passive-Aggressiveness.
Pros
Terrafugia does have several pros which make it an attractive place to work, especially in the aerospace and/or automotive industries. The benefits are excellent and include great healthcare coverage, an employee incentivized flight training program (where the company pays for ground school and offers flight lessons at a discounted rate) and tuition reimbursement. Additionally, the salaries are extremely competitive for either aerospace or automotive industries & in the Boston Area. The above is spear-headed by an HR team who greatly wants to see the best in their employees & works hard to ensure people are happy. Complimentary to the benefits, the technology that the company envisions to create is also a strong tractor beam for top talent. Aside from the flying car, the TF-2 product could certainly disrupt the transportation industry, but unfortunately for the reasons below – it’s unlikely that the company will ever see it come to fruition.
Cons
As the purpose of a Glassdoor review is for others to assess a company, I have attempted to be as objective as possible. The cons of the company are as follows: 1. The collection of individuals who make up the Upper level management (Directors & Above, except for the CEO) is one of the worst assemblages of talent in the history of the aerospace industry. They create a toxic environment that people continually cite when expressing their distaste for coming to work. The Senior Level management team is supposed to empower and build up the employees around them. Rather, this team beats their teams down through passive-aggressiveness, sarcasm and opaqueness. The management strategy here is "manage through fear and berate into submission." Collaboration & inclusiveness are preached during All-Hands, but exclusiveness & arrogance is what is practiced. The managers consist mostly of “old Terrafugia” employees who now act as though they are in a high-school clique. It is truly remarkable how dysfunctional the entire organization is from a personnel perspective. 2. The second most critical “con” of the Company is the self-derived image of grandeur and unrealistic product delivery schedule. The current schedule for product delivery is a complete joke, and 100% unrealistic. The company refuses to acknowledge the significant gaps in technological readiness level and manufacturing readiness level which still exist. Couple this with fundamental flaws in their engineering capability of the technical team and it is a recipe for failure. The strongest pillar of this company is the marketing team, of whom I don’t envy because every day they are forced to pedal what amounts to basic lies about the vehicle’s production readiness level & capabilities. There is a complete and utterly incomprehensible break between reality and the self-developed disillusion of the ability to deliver a product on schedule, cost or technical capability. The roadable aircraft is destined to sputter out and die. The only hope for the company is TF-2, which as a Part 23 aircraft will be an incredible challenge for this team of individuals who already think they are the greatest, most capable assembly of engineers. They continually to fail to appreciate the lessons learned from other companies, as if they “know better”; a completely undeserved rite..