- Despite the marketing campaign, culture is hierarchical, political, and heavily micro-managed.
- Discriminatory and harassing behavior from management, including personal criticism and openly mocking employee ideas, even when those ideas have business sponsors.
- Immature "frat boy" culture is tolerated (ex: nerf-gun battles in large open space during business hours). I heard racist and misogynistic comments from both employees and management.
- Objectives are unclear, goalposts shift, and promotions do not consistently reflect performance (both ways).
- High turnover with hiring focusing on profiles without industrial experience, nor formal education. This may suit juniors but limits growth for experienced professionals.
- I was explicitly told to prefer hiring cheaper non-Swiss and non-EU employees dependent on sponsored visas (so they cannot easily leave).
- Engineering culture is weak at the detriment of quality (more programmers than engineers). Very little specifications, code reviews, testing, and Agile practices (and PM methods in general).
- Security and regulatory requirements are not always met. Confidential client identification data have been exposed internally.
- A lot of talk about AI (to replace employees...), innovation, and bringing in external ideas, but execution is superficial. The company prefers business as usual and isn't aware that others have quietly already integrated new technologies to assist their employees (not replace them).
- Under management pressure, Swissquote offers highly speculative and ephemeral assets emitted by a certain political spectrum in the US (you know what I’m talking about…).
- The open-space and cafeteria are noisy, dirty, and crowded. Telework is inflexible (3 days in the office minimum, can’t choose telework days). No laptops for home office and laggy remote desktop sessions.
- Salaries are below market-value and shares/stock options are not worth it now that the hyper growth period has passed. "Benefits" like a pub, free fruits and coffee, are negligible.
- High Glassdoor scores should be taken with a grain of salt. I saw office campaigns encouraging positive reviews in front of line managers.