A toxic company that destroyed my physical and mental health - Avis employé Systems Analyst TPP

I want to be clear to anybody who is reading this - I'm not writing this review out of spite or because I have a chip on my shoulder and looking to vent. I'm well past that at this point - I left the company years ago now and have moved on to doing work I love. I'm writing this because I genuinely don't want anybody to have to go through the stress and anguish that I did because it took a lot out of me and took me a long time to recover from. I worked at this company for several years, and looking back on it, I cannot believe I stayed there as long as I did. By the time I finally left, my physical and mental health were a total wreck and it took about two years of medication and dedicated effort to fully recover. The culture in this company is absolutely toxic and it all stems from the CEO, who is not a man who is going to change his behaviour or that of the company in this lifetime. TPP has no respect for your personal time or abilities as an individual. They employ people with no qualifications and then expect them to pick up and run with any task despite having no training. I witnessed people suddenly being handed entire projects to manage at a moment's notice, being asked to design major UI elements with no prior experience, or put together technical documentation for parts of the system they had no familiarity with. Employees are expected to be on call 24/7 and come into the office for any reason - holidays and visiting family or friends are no excuse and will get you berated because 'this is what you agreed to do'. If anybody asks for a 'volunteer' to do weekend or evening work, you MUST 'volunteer' immediately or face questioning as to why not. No excuse is good enough - it's what's expected and you don't get a choice. Push back and they'll fire you (which you may find is a blessing in disguise). The company preaches a 'flat hierarchy', but the reality is that it's run by the people who are most 'Phoenix' (yes, they really use that term). What this means is that it's the people who are most at home with pressuring, bullying and confronting others who get to call the shots. Whenever somebody quits or is fired, people just say they 'weren't Phoenix enough' and tell everybody that they'll be fine if they just do what's expected of them. Once you're back on the outside, you see this behaviour for what it is - a cult, plain and simple. When you're inside, you're made to think it's normal to be blunt, confrontational, aggressive and to shame others publicly for making a mis-step. When something unforseen occurs, you will be expected to 'own up' to the mistake and 'admit' that it's something you should have anticipated. It's a cardinal sin to dare suggest something isn't your fault. TPP like to tell you that you will be 'empowered' when working for them, which is their way of saying they will throw you into the deep end with no training. How 'empowered' do you think you would feel if you were required to have every email checked by somebody senior before you were given approval to send it? How would you feel if you were told to delete sentences like 'Hope you're enjoying the weather' when emailing stakeholders because 'it's unnecessary and waffling'. 'Empowerment' for TPP is becoming an emotionless automaton who is loyal to the company. Speaking of 'empowerment', you WILL be micromanaged. At any time, somebody can come to your desk and fire off the following questions: - What are you doing right now? - How long will it take you? - What will you do after that? - How long will that take? - What will you do if it takes longer? - Who will you tell if it overruns? You will need to answer every question without hesitation. That's what 'Phoenixed' people do. You can also fully expect that somebody else will then come along and demand something completely different gets done and berate you if you try to suggest that you're too busy. You're 'empowered', which means you can't say that 'somebody asked me to do this' - you need to ~believe~ that it's the best thing to do and argue the point. Except if you're junior to whoever is demanding the work gets done then you will be wrong. And once you start doing their task, you'll have the same conversation with the original person and get berated again for not doing their work. I can say with absolute certainty that the positive reviews on this site are a result of the company demanding that current employees create accounts and leave 5-star ratings. You can believe they've got a list and that they are expecting employees to confirm when they've posted a company-approved review. The same thing happened with the Times 'Top 100 Small Companies to Work For' awards, which is why TPP are now permanently banned from participating in that award. I honestly could go on. I could go on and on and on with a hundred examples of the awful behaviour and conditions that lie behind the facade of nice offices and an attractive benefits package. If money and benefits are literally your only motivator and you're willing to be a sociopathic, obedient drone then that is the only scenario where I could recommend this company. For anybody else, ask yourself why this company is paying in excess of £40k for people with zero experience and ALWAYS recruiting. The turnover is staggering and the vile culture is to blame.