Yes, companies can change policies as they grow. It's frustrating, but not uncommon. If you're unhappy, consider discussing it with HR or looking for other opportunities.

Software Engineer

I joined a mid sized Startup in January last year,  where the offer letter stated flexible working hours and unlimited leave policy, around September last year they introduced a leave and a wfh pol...

Welcome to IT Company Discussion's Private Community

I joined a mid sized Startup in January last year,  where the offer letter stated flexible working hours and unlimited leave policy, around September last year they introduced a leave and a wfh policy which was fine, now they are planning to turn it into a shift based system and everyone will need to clock in x hours and put a completely planned leave and wfh policy(no ad hoc allowed ever). 
Is this normal for companies to change the polices this frequently and isn't it false promising to do such practices.
I mean what is next they reduce my salary to half with some weird stipulation and still I can't do anything about it?

Company switching up cultural policies after 6 months from initial joining

Company switching up cultural policies after 6 months from initial joining- Grapevine

Welcome to Indian Startups's Private Community

I am interviewing with an early stage startup in Gurgaon. As part of their leave policy, they offer only annual leaves which you earn at a certain rate every month. They do not offer any sick leaves or casual leaves to employees. Is that even legal? Have you heard of similar policies elsewhere?

Leave policy at startups

Business Development Manager

Welcome to Office Gossip's Private Community

Hey I have worked in 2 startups in my careers, In both places leave policies aren't that great.
Just wanted to know what are policies in other workplaces

Leave policies

Share your employer toxic trait/policy.

I'll go first 👇🏻

- My employer hired me when it was Fully WFH, now they force me to join office after 8 months of joining.
- Attend 5 days/week
- No hybrid
- Biometric system to track attendance 
- Complete 180 hours in a month or pay cut
- No relocation support
- Less appraisal (~5%) citing market conditions.
- Removed unlimited leaves just a few days below announcing WFO.

FYI: I was named best employee for 2023 Q1

Toxic company traits

Welcome to Software Engineers's Private Community

Can’t take more than 5days leave together in a month.
No WFH

Worst leave policy!!

So I joined a startup on Oct, 23(6 months completed).  They are struggling to raise funds. From Jan, they started layoffs from ops and customer support, went to major cost-cutting: no tea, snacks, giving the floor to rent, restricting the leaves: like for leave, you have to get approval from HR and the CEO, not the manager.  I'm in a tech team, and multiple products are lined up for release, so work is there, but ultra micro-managing. I'm getting opportunities but I'm not sure whether to switch or not. 

I leave my last job in 5 months due to their funding issue. That's why I'm skeptical to leave or not. 

Would love to hear advice.

To switch or not

I'm in an Indian crypto startup about 1y5m into existence and our product is in early beta right now. I've been a part since about 1y3m. I was the first hire.

The reason I'm considering a switch is because i was told we're a remote first company at the time of interviewing and after my joining they switched to in-office and all hires after me were required to relocate. They haven't made it a requirement for me yet.
I can't relocate, but now everyone except me is in-office and there's always a disconnect between me and the team. 

Decisions and discussions are done without me and I'm just told what they concluded. Sometimes even deadlines are set without informing me about the task even and i have to work/manage according to them.

I'm also technically the senior-most person after the CTO/manager (all others are either freshers or 1YOE). This has sort of restricted my growth as there's no one to review my prs or someone i can have a deep dive technical conversation with.

By how much I understand the manager and team are happy with me and my work. Also, I'm possibly the highest paid dev even as compared to the ones with the similar YOE.

I'm a frontend/fullstack engineer and the quality of work seems fine but i feel i could be doing and learning more in my field.

The culture and WLB has changed slowly for the worse as compared to when i was hired. 
Stuff like the leave policy and the whole in-office thing are the negatives.
But the manager doesn't ping me much regarding my work so that's a plus.

Switching doesn't feel ethical as the majority of the code is written by me and we're an early stage startup.
Not to mention with layoffs happening all around and a possible recession around the corner, it's not the best choice to switch i guess.

Any suggestions would be helpful!

If your company is hiring please let me know that as well.

TC - ₹18lakhs pa
YOE - 1y4m + 1y6m if you count startup contract work as exp

Should I switch?

For context: Weekends are off. So just fri WFH. This is a Series B startup. I am not even asking for a leave but WFH for just 1 day. I joined recently. The only thing I did wrong was possibly informing a little too late.

Want to get opinion if I am overthinking or this classifies as toxic culture in startups where you are expected to push limits above and beyond regularly and sometimes weekends.

---

Is this toxic work culture or I am overthinking

Not a great culture, also you don’t have to give the actual reason, instead say due to some unavoidable work or family health reason you will need to wfh. Its a good way of seeing what kind of employer one is, when they also treat urgencies like that. Indians feel they need to give a detailed explanation as to why they deserve wfh or leave, whereas in international companies, you just have to inform the manager.

Senior Designer

Growth Manager

A 2 yrs old small B2C startup has put the following conditions along with offer letter to my friend: 

1. 6 months probation period.
2. 7 days notice period during probation.
3. 7 leaves during probation.
4. ESOPs will be given after 3 months of performance evaluation. 
5. No WFH (might get on situation basis), might need to work on Saturdays as well if required.

there are about 15 tech team members, they are in the growth phase right now.

are these conditions normal for a small startup? 

what else does he need to find before joining?

Is this a Red Flag ?

Senior Software Engineer

Context: I work at a startup, it's a pretty chill work environment, very flexible, hybrid model. Everything is great.

Problem: They take flexible work hours too seriously, I have meetings at 10 PM on weekdays and almost every weekend there's some work which they need the next day in most cases but apparently have to keep the meeting on the weekend with no prior notice.

I mean, i like going to office twice a week around 11-12 and coming back around 7, wfh when I have a few meetings that day but is it normal to work on weekends? and after work hours?

P.S. I've only been in this company for a month and joined as a fresher.

Now that I've put it down, this is such a gen z problem lol

But what should I do?

working post work hours and on weekends?

Product Designer

Should I take up a job offer which offers me a peace of mind but not much of a hike or stay within the current organisation get the appraisal which is somewhat similar to the new offer. 

Early in my career the main reason I’m even considering the job offer is that the current organisation the work culture has gone to $#! . It’s basically working on favouritism, unrealistic targets and no work life balance at all.

Career Advice

Assistant Manager

Half day salary cut for every 3 days you're late is pretty freakin messed up.
Curious to know what other ancient capatilist policies do corporates have in place to exploit all of us?

What are some dystopian policies at your work place?

Nomura requires you to clock your time out when you use the restrooms.

Product Manager

Intern

I have been talking to a few companies, across different size bands.
Only Indian startups seem to obsessed with full week WFO/Micromanagement.

A few years back, startups were known for being more flexible, now it just seems to be the reverse.

Why are Indian startups so obsessed with Micromanagement? i.e. WFO

I know a lot of folks will not agree, but when it comes to accountability (+ some integrity), the vast majority are really really behind. Those who show some are stomped up on as well.  
  
 The only way to get over this might be to micromanage. I'm not in support of it, but I myself have been seeing a change around me because of some people, a few others will also have to suffer from micro-management. Yes, it's not easy on me/my mind, but the work is moving a bit more.  
  
 I've seen this at a lot of places. I usually trust others with things, but the results have more often disappointed me. Now, I just delegate only of it's really required.

Founder

Despite meeting all targets, I've been put under PIP. The HR is saying that I have one month to improve my performance or I'll be asked to leave, and that too without severance. 

I just want to know if there are similar policies at your company?  Means are you not eligible for severance if you are being asked to leave under PIP?

I've been put under PIP at Unacademy

This is just a way for the company to escape from paying severance pay. 
  
 Start looking for a new job and move on. 
  
 Be confident that’s it’s nothing to do with your skills or capabilities.

Consultant

Software Developer

I recently got an offer from a seed stage startup for a SDE2 role. They shared the offer in a 2 liner mail. Weirdly enough they have a probation period of 3 months which could also be extended to 6 months during which there'll be no paid leaves, nothing, and you cannot be late to the office any day.
I asked them to share the detailed offer letter with all these verbal probation clauses penned down and they've not replied for a week.
After getting the offer, they asked me to submit my adhar card, pan card, 10th, 12th marksheet, graduation certificate, passport, birth certificate, payslips, previous offer letter, resignation mail, proof of bonuses and all sorts of documents. 

It's funny how they think trust only works one way. I've withdrawn the application as there were too many red flags during the entire process. I really wish the Indian corporate system had an open culture where trust is bidirectional and not act like we're at the mercy of their job.

Funny interview at a startup

Is it a red flag if a company is frequently making changes to the paystub components? The CTC remains the same but they keep moving around things on the paystub. Like decrease certain component and increase other. I've noticed this occur closer to the tax season. Also, they keep updating the employment portal and later have all employees accept their offer letters again (because they have slyly added some text regarding this shuffling and juggling of components). Is this even legal in India?

Company randomly changing components on paystubs

Joined this organization as an SDE. Initially, had a great experience for the first few months, got to learn a lot. However, eventually, the management (co-founder) started showing his true colors where they would favor a few people who would say yes to everything the co-founder had to say, while others who asked for justification would suffer.

One such issue is the lack of concrete documentation for policies, and surprise, surprise, the policies change based on the mood of the founders. HR, oh, where can I begin? I honestly haven't seen them work, other than salary processing, where they have outsourced their work like LinkedIn management and basic tasks such as wishing employees on their birthdays. This is perfectly fine with the co-founder, as he considers this innovative.
Unnecessarily, we are forced to follow processes that hamper productivity, and we have to attend meetings for half the day. Still, they expect us to work for more than 10 hours when the salary is peanuts—hell, even peanuts are better; at least we can have them with alcohol.

My learning is saturated, and there’s no zeal to learn as the manager and others demotivate you. The most frustrating part is the quarterly rewards, which make no sense, as the rewards are given to people who can appease their managers (confirmed).

And now that we have increments incoming, they have all of a sudden started highlighting mistakes, finding mistakes even if they don’t exist. Like one such example was the co-founder asking us to write a script when the script was already shown, and asking for an update on a JIRA ticket when it was already given in the comments.

They lost my respect when they started canceling people’s PTOs and disturbing people on their much-needed PTOs where they spend time with their families and unwind. The co-founder asks the PO to call and disturb the developer on their much-needed vacations after working for long hours and weekends as he wants to satisfy his ego.

Rant post

Any PM or Dev from Navi here!!
I just saw it’s Glassdoor rating is 2.1,is it that bad?

Company switching up cultural policies after 6 months from initial joining

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