Vantaggi
I was able to meet some great people in Boston, Greensburg, and Leipzig. I learned a lot and credit it to the sales managers in Boston. I made incredible connections throughout the industry. I was listened to and encouraged to speak out.
Svantaggi
The company got too comfortable in the past decade and now aren't able to keep up with their competitors. They'll be bankrupt by 2018. The VP and Director of Sales tried numerous times to wake up the execs in Germany but were not listened to. The problem wasn't that the SALES TEAM IN BOSTON was incompetent, it was that no one would listen to them and they had to play the hand they were dealt. The morale in the office is depressing. Depressing enough that you can't get out of bed. They've had 3 rounds of layoffs since January and there are more to come. They just laid off the people with the most experience (their last hope) with clients, agencies, and connections. The disconnect between North America and Germany really sets the tone for the way the departments are divided. No one collaborates. No one helps each other. They still haven't figured out that the way you market to Europe will not translate to dollars in the US. Communication is bad. The engineers do whatever they want and don't tell the departments that actually deals with clients and customers about the changes. Developers whose jobs are to fix things when they break will refuse to fix a platform bug if they don't think it's critical. Their expertise is to fix things not to judge based off of their little knowledge of user experience. Production is a joke. Samples for Key Account always got messed up. Print quality is poor no matter how many tests are run. And, for some reason, QA doesn't catch print errors and sends apparel with HOLES in them out all the time. Saving the best for last- The HR department is what has ruined the years I've invested working at Spreadshirt. God forbid you're given more than 2 weeks notice that insurance is changing. They screw up people's paychecks EVERY TIME they change something so simple in the system. If you get a raise of bonus, it won't be paid out until at least a month later. For Christmas, they'll show you how much your contribution means to the company by sending you a tin can with a Capri Sun and old Halloween candy - Am I in Kindergarten? WORST OF ALL, they do not respond to you in a timely manner. Ever. You can Skype, call, email and CC God himself but you won't get an answer until it's too late.