SAS R&D Scotland - Glasgow office
Pros
Some talented and highly capable colleagues. Many nice, pleasant, and straight-forward people in the office. The morale and atmosphere within the Glasgow office is usually quite good. Decent benefits package, but nothing special overall, if you look across the market. Good pension package after two years at the company. A multi-national with many different business areas, allowing for cross-collaboration, and internal job changes across divisions, countries, and offices. The Glasgow office is a nice, pleasant, and modern office - as are many of the other SAS offices, especially Cary. Generous COVID arrangements - monthly payment to help cover bills when working from home, etc. Hybrid working. Exceptional internal events, including trips out, sponsored events - such as sponsored horse racing, meals, drinks, vouchers, and an outstanding annual football tournament (before COVID). Lots of complimentary food, drinks and snacks. The opportunity to meet, and work with, people from all over the world, offering a different perspective on things. Excellent choice for graduates as there's a massive focus on hiring them in Glasgow, as opposed to hiring proven and experienced people. Overall, the work-life balance is good in the Glasgow office. Generally speaking, the pace of work may well be slower than other tech companies. There is a moderate, and a quite conservative, way of working throughout the company - you don't get pushed to the limit, overall. Some people will not like this. There's a fascinating array of colourful and exotic characters working in the development area of the office.
Cons
The Glasgow office of SAS was originally a different company, acquired by SAS over a decade ago. Consequently, the small business vibe that a lot of people liked, has now all but disappeared. With regards to industry competition, SAS are suffering on two fronts: On one front, open source technologies can do the same thing as SAS, but for free. On the other front, they are fighting the corporate elite that are muscling in on the traditional areas that SAS once dominated. There's no easy way out for SAS, apart from to be acquired a larger company. The CEO is well beyond retirement age, fresh ideas are needed. The CEO succession plans are unclear, with potential successors constantly leaving the company. The pay is okay, but not great. There are almost always companies within Glasgow that pay more, hence they lose a lot of good people. A lot of graduates that they hire just leave after two years to a better paid job. As a result, there's a constant conveyer belt of people fresh out of university, with little or no commercial, or life experience, that will simply leave as soon as they can find a tier 1 salary for their role. The heavy focus with hiring graduates has meant that, over the past several years, very few people with genuine experience and proven ability have actually been hired. Drink your koolaid! The problem is that none of the hype stands up to scrutiny once you study how other tech companies are doing. Nauseating company propaganda. One or two middle-managers and team leaders have been promoted beyond their competence. Strangely cliquey, though I hear it's far, far worse in Cary. Some favouritism - probably not worth staying long if you aren't in the core group. As mentioned above, there are people rotting in their position. Senior management don't really target people as aggressively as they do in other companies. Therefore, a lot of deadwood gets accumulated - people who could and should have moved on years ago simply remain in their position. Many of the experienced people worked for Memex, the company acquired by SAS. These people are extremely well established, but entrenched in their positions, that they will rarely vacate. Subsequently, a lot of the promotion pathways are blocked, and remain blocked. A lot of legacy software, and old fashioned technologies. Many of the technologies that you will be using will not be modern, or considered current. Future recruiters may not necessarily value the technologies that you used at SAS. Tokenistic approach to personal development and growth, for those not in the favoured group. Obsessed with "anonymous" company surveys. Inconsistent and incoherent criteria for growth within the company. Some promotion criteria was written 30 years ago, out-of-date, partially incorrect, and I suspect was written for somebody based in the Cary office only.
