Pros
The only good reason I could think of is that one can learn how to deal with difficult obstinate management. Two cups of coffee/tea.
Cons
i will try to present an unbiased impersonal review of what it is like to work here. The company is now called SD2 labs and also, SD Squared Labs. It’s also the parent company of Shoto, and the review here equally applies to Shoto. I had a brief stint here. The employees here live in constant fear of losing their jobs. Termination at SD2 Labs/ SD Squared is sudden, and full of personal insults, and is usually without a compensation. As far as it has been observed, its a culture of hire and fire, both at SD2/SD Squared and Shoto. People are hired when they get a project, and fired within months after the project finishes. The number of people who have been here for over a year is very very low. Its very common to see new faces, only to see them disappear soon. The average employee lifecycle here is under 6 months, and therefore, incentives like ESOPs are never availed coz employees are either fired abruptly after the work is done, or they quit on their own. The environment is toxic and counter productive making it nearly impossible to enjoy your work. The management especially the CEO keeps insulting and offending people all the time. They have an intangible leave policy of unlimited leaves, which in effect means you virtually don’t get any leaves, irrespective of how seriously you need it, coz they never approve any leaves. There were instances when people were warned about a 5x deduction from their monthly salary coz they had to take a leave. An employee is allowed a maximum of two cups of either tea or coffee everyday. Racism is very pronounced here, when you get to work with your US counterparts, Indian employees are mistreated and misbehaved with all the time. They are treated like slaves, and I have seen people working non stop for over 2-3 days, without any sleep, or tea/coffee to stay awake, only to invariably face the CEO’s wrath. The kind of language he uses in scrums is offensive and shocking, and almost everyday he says something that he can be sued for. Employees feel greatly devalued leading a corrupted professional as well as personal lives. For all intents, employees are expected to be available 24/7 for work. Its nearly impossible to talk sense into the CEO, since he does not listen to anyone. He has been trying to develop an in house app called Shoto for over 4 years now. But its a complete failure, solely attributed to a sycophantic CEO, who does not know how to keep his employees happy, and work professionally with colleagues. He is devoid of any form of leadership, does not know how to motivate, or lead the way, but is adept at ensuring that his employees are dehumanized and derided. He never trusts his employees. Appraisals are rarely given and they never exceed 7-8% even if you have been slogging your guts out all day and night. With all the false promises they make when they want to get the work done, they have a carrot-stick approach towards their employees. I joined the company, and I regard it as one of the worst mistakes that I ever committed which led to a colossal waste of my time, energy, career, peace, happiness and general well-being.
