SAP reviews

Too many layers of management. Very top heavy. For example, in one department, there might be 3 middle managers with 4 direct reports between them. Company doesn't stick to it's "no-jerks" rule. Managers are quick to point out mistakes, usually in a rude manner, but when trying to point out that a manager has made a mistake, it is total "radio silence". Their ego's are too big, apparently. Seems to be a common theme at SF. Pay-for-performance is a joke. A remote employee who sends too many emails to their manager (located in another city/state) is dinged on their performance review for poor communication skills and doesn't receive a raise. There is no feed-back from managers beforehand to keep things like this from happening. Too many daily emails consisting of disingenuous nonsense from the executive level regarding how awesome we (meaning "they") are. Lars is the worst. Always sharing irrelevant stories about attending the Grammy's, bragging about phone calls from his Porsche dealer, or waxing poetic about his friends museum-quality art collections. He seems to have no clue how to relate to his employees. Too much a** kissing. Upper level executives have a tendency to behave like cheerleaders and pat each other on the back (marketing and HR are the worst). Definitely a "look-at-me-aren't-I-awesome" culture.

SAP is a coporate, political jungle where the best and brightest ideas, insights, and even questions are stiffled. IF there's even time to do it, very few meaningful learning opportunities exist beyond e-learning and learning on the job (often under less-than-ideal conditions). The top performers, <10% of the workforce get the most development opportunities in an effort to keep them from leaving the company. Interesting since most people leave within 3 years and they (the 10%) are the ones who need it the least. There's very little trust at SAP and work/Life balance does not exist at SAP. Your workload will almost always be enough work for 2 - 3 people. Because it is a global company, it is common to start your day at 6am (sometimes as early as 3am) with a conference call and end the same day with another meeting at 9pm in order to accommodate colleagues in a different time zone. 3 - 5 year strategic plans change significantly every few months. That means that the work done for projects and/or objectives that were agreed upon at the beginning of the year was all for nothing. There are multiple re-orgs and people change managers (assigned new managers) like they change socks. I had 6 manager changes in 4 years.