Pros
- The onboarding process was excellent. HR staff were proactive, communicative, and time between each interview stage and the final decision were short. They accommodated my request to visit the office before accepting the offer. - The office is great. Nice facilities (has the usual hot desking issues, but they have recently expanded so there are more desks and break-out rooms now). The site staff and Ipsen colleagues on site are all lovely. The atmosphere in the office despite the RTO mandate is surprisingly very positive. They look after us in the office, lots of free drinks and snacks and heavily subsidised lunch. Days in the office seem to be flexible and not micromanaged. There are plenty of optional social events that people willingly voluntarily engage with. - I like my role and the colleagues I've worked with so far. Everyone I've met to date is competent and willing to work together. There's a naturally diverse range of people which I appreciate. - The pipeline (in my personal opinion) is healthy and strong - It's early days (I've not passed probation yet) but career opportunities look good and there's plenty of training available. You are actively encouraged to seek out and implement opportunities for improvement.
Cons
- You hit the ground running. There are good attempts at onboarding, but it's difficult to fully dedicate time to this while also completing you day-job work so early on. There's lots of work to do, in part due to the strong pipeline, and in part I suspect due to past FTE under-resourcing. It is possible that the French work-culture contributes to the sense of urgency and (happy!)choas too. I have frequently had to work during lunch, had a couple of late evenings, and saw colleagues working over national holidays. I'm not sure yet what the work-life balance culture is like as to whether this is normal or sustainable.