Reply to: Big vs small company culture

[DieScum]

Obviously it depends on the company.

One thing I find in big companies is management by statistic. So it's the stats that matter not the actual job you are supposed to be doing.

In small companies I have found you are focussed on the job. Can't hide behind the stats.

I generally prefer small companies to work in but big companies are the ones paying the money.

[SueEllen]

Oddly enough every large company I've worked for the management treat the employees like slaves as they are only interested in what the chief accountant in the company says to keep the share price up.

They also try that on with contractors.

There as smaller companies want you make them money so they don't care how or when you work as long as you are producing them stuff that makes them money.

Oh and the only projects I've worked on where the design isn't ad-hoc (then documented later to look like it isn't) are defence projects. With big companies they pretend they have a design there as small companies don't even bother with the pretence.

[d000hg]

From my experience I could see following difference:

Big company

* A well defined process for doing everything
* Things are planned and seldom adhoc
* People usually behave well and everyone is treated professionally
* Good documentation
* Good breathing space in office

This is applicable even if working in a small team in big company.

Small company

* Almost no proper process on anything. Everything is adhoc.
* People do design on one side or page and coding on other side
* No best practice standard
* Managers/directors often treat employees as slaves
* Small office makes people claustrophobic
* People always have work under pressure (as nothing is planned)

So, going forward, I decided to work in big organizations only (if I have a choice between big and small) even if pay is slightly lower in comparison.

All you've done is list the pros of one Vs the cons of the other.

[Brussels Slumdog]

Big Company lttle space

One of the big companies that I contracted for had an open desk policy which meant that only the guy
that signed my time sheet had a fixed desk. There were 50 spaces for 250 employees on a FIGD First in get desk. The company gambled that the other 150 worked from home,were sick,on holiday or still commuting. It worked as the 50 spaces were never full.
If you came early you could look out the window all day but if you came late you sat next to the guy that signed the time sheets meaning you had to look busy.
Why does this theory not work with the UK Social housing? 100000 chasing 1000 houses?

The bigger the company the more people you have to invite to a meeting so its like working for the UNO
Shed loads of emails,decision papers and not much action.
First you make a decision whether it is possible to do then you make a decision not to do it because its not according to group rules. By this time its the end of the contract.

[mobi]

Big - thousands+ employees, at least a building of its own or multiple buildings, offices spanning multiple cities/countries, £100m or more turnover, having an offshore presence etc.

Small - less than 100 employees, office not bigger than one floor, turnover less than £10m/year

Medium - between big and small

[mudskipper]

What's your definition of big and small? Is it based on number of employees/turnover? And where's the threshold? (genuinely curious - not being pedantic!)

[dspsyssts]

Are you joking?

That room looks like some kind of evil David Brent like office punishment to me complete with wacky Homer Simpson poster.

Hay I had a lot of freshly cooked bacon sarnies in there while watching TV on double time at the weekends, very cushty.

I kid you not one of the shiftleaders would play one of those guitars while walking around the datacentre changing tapes.

Can't see that going down well at Multinational Conglomerate Ltd.

I'll take the small company any day having said that working at British American Tobacco meant free cigarettes for all, and free food 24x7 in the canteen...oh well.

Cough.

[Mephisto]

BigCo. = Lots of SmallCo.s with much adhoc-ery and/or naff out of date processes!

Or is that worse in terms of simplistic observation?

[TheVoice]

hahahahahaha do me a favour.

The big clients are the ones who are in the biggest mess usually & are totally arse about face with everything.

Many of my smaller clients (except perhaps 2, who both went bust anyway) have been the best I ever worked with in terms of being organised & taking the advice of the professional they were paying a significant sum to advise them.

The big boys pay a large wedge of cash for my advice, only to ignore it, makes me wonder why I bother sometimes?!!

[DieScum]

http://i254.photobucket.com/albums/h...a/restroom.jpg

Are you joking?

That room looks like some kind of evil David Brent like office punishment to me complete with wacky Homer Simpson poster.

[curtis]

I've always preferred bigger companies as its easier to go and hide for a while !!!

I've had a number of contracts where work has dried up and in a small one its been very hard to find things to pass the time, in a larger one you can just go and walk round the office and that will waste 5/10 mins or equally hide in the toilet for half an hour and no-one questions where you have been!!!!

[NickFitz]

Yeah very true, after working for UBS, JP Morgan, Sony and IBM I prefer small companies that keep their monthly back-ups in a cardboard box under a desk somewhere and that have a rest room with at least two guitars, good TV and dvd player like my last one did.....nice.

Then again, bigger companies can have offices with more interesting views - full-res version here, if Kim Cattrall's cleavage is that important to you.

Not that I'm an ardent fan of SaTC, but a few weeks before we'd had The Rolling Stones out there, and there were Scarlett Johansson and Natalie Portman in The Other Boleyn Girl - oh, and now I come to think of it, HM Queen Elizabeth II rocked up for that one

Actually, QE II was the only one out of all the "celebrities" out there who looked like she'd had a decent meal sometime in her life. Keith Richards looked like he'd never eaten at all, but he also looked like something from a recently-excavated thirteenth-century cemetery and had probably had a huge steak just before arriving - he just looks like that.

Still, the point is that you don't get to see that sort of stuff out the window of a small business in Bromsgrove, and a lot of bigger companies are, in reality, no more burdened down with irritating management bulltulip systems than small companies can be. Then again, small businesses don't tend to be overburdened with middle management, which is always a good thing.

The last time I worked in a very small business (which I really enjoyed) was as a permie during the dotcom slump. One of the owner-directors walked in to the studio one day and said "I think we should have one of those disclaimers at the bottom of our company emails."

"I don't think that's a good idea," I replied.

"Why not?"

"Because it would make us look like retards."

He didn't ask again. I don't think the redundancy package I received a couple of months later was related to that conversation, though

[blacjac]

Yeah very true, after working for UBS, JP Morgan, Sony and IBM I prefer small companies that keep their monthly back-ups in a cardboard box under a desk somewhere and that have a rest room with at least two guitars, good TV and dvd player like my last one did.....nice.

Where's the toilet?

[kaiser78]

The answer to this conumdrum is .... 1

[dspsyssts]

You clearly never worked in an Investment Bank, then. They are BIG, but completely the opposite of what you've quoted above. Try searching a few forum posts on the subject.

Yeah very true, after working for UBS, JP Morgan, Sony and IBM I prefer small companies that keep their monthly back-ups in a cardboard box under a desk somewhere and that have a rest room with at least two guitars, good TV and dvd player like my last one did.....nice.