Pros
The work culture and atmosphere is one of the best I have worked in. Cognifide is very non-hierarchical and there are no barriers to approaching anyone, whether that's the CEO or interns. The work environment is relaxed and people produce some really excellent work, it's energising to work with some really smart people. There is plenty of opportunity for anyone that wants to carve out an area of specialism, and the way the company is growing, there will be no shortage of opportunity in the future for people that want to develop in their careers. Cognifide has an amazing list of clients and working here gives you exposure to some of the world's biggest and most influential marketing teams and industry thought leaders. Progression in Cognifide is very merit based. This means you have to have built up experience not only when things are going well, but also learning how to deal with things when they don't run smoothly. I think this approach can be a little frustrating for people that want to progress rapidly, but it does build a good foundation of experience for people that want to develop a solid and well rounded base of experience. The work environment is very social, and employees often organise things out of hours, whether that's after work beers, or weekend events.
Cons
No company is perfect, and in the case of Cognifide, it has been growing really rapidly over the last few years, which always puts some pressure on the company and creates the need for change. The acquisition by WPP and the move into the Wunderman offices has been a significant change for a company moving from a startup to a fairly large business with quite serious clients. The additional stress of the final year of earn-out has created added performance pressure, but even then it's not as pressurised as other companies I have worked in. There is a bit of uncertainty with some people about what will happen when Cognifide becomes more integrated with Wunderman and WPP, but this can create opportunities too. Overall there are few major negatives and I enjoy working at Cognifide