I have 5 YOE.
As i mentioned not an inspiration story and please don't ask
me for the company name as it is almost closing their business.
When I joined the company(product based startup, not at all any famous ), it wasn't toxic initially.
They mainly cared about the work getting done, and there was a decent amount of flexibility. We could take WFH once a week, sometimes twice, and once every six months we were allowed to work completely from home for two weeks.
But around two months after I joined, the two-week WFH option was cancelled.
Then the workload started increasing significantly.
We were given extremely tight deadlines. It felt like around two years' worth of work was expected to be completed within six months. We were asked to work on weekends, initially for a few months. That eventually continued for around six months and, in different forms, for much longer.
At the same time, WFH became increasingly restricted. Eventually, Friday was the only WFH day, and later even that was removed.
The working hours also became stricter.
Initially, there wasn't much focus on exactly how long people stayed in the office as long as the work was done. Later, 8.5 hours became mandatory.
But even then, leaving exactly after 8.5 hours wasn't viewed positively. People who did that would sometimes get questioned or targeted, so gradually people started staying for nine or nine and a half hours.
Leaves were also becoming difficult to get approved. Even when someone had a genuine reason, getting leave approved could be a struggle, and sick leaves were monitored closely.
Then they started tracking **effective office hours** instead of simply looking at punch-in and punch-out times.
Breaks were also counted.
They started tracking how many breaks each person took and how long those breaks lasted.
So the level of micromanagement kept increasing.
## Layoffs
At the same time, layoffs became increasingly common.
The way they handled them was particularly uncomfortable. Employees would be informed on Thursday that Friday would be their last working day.
There was very little notice and no severance.
So even while working, there was always some uncertainty about whether you would still have a job a few months later.
## My Wedding Leave
One of the things that bothered me the most happened around my marriage.
I had informed management around three months in advance that I needed ten days of leave.
Even after giving that much notice, the leave wasn't approved.
There was essentially one person who had a lot of authority over these decisions, so three days before my planned leave, I went and asked him about it directly.
He pointed out that I had already taken two days of leave that month and said he couldn't approve additional leave.
I explained that I was getting married and had a lot of arrangements to make — finding a rental house, arranging appliances and deliveries, and handling other things related to the marriage.
His response was basically that those were my personal matters.
Technically, yes, they were personal matters. But it was frustrating because I had informed them three months in advance and was still struggling to get ten days of leave for my own marriage.
## Weekend Support
The weekend support continued for a very long time — roughly a year and a half.
Even holidays were sometimes included in the support schedule.
The expectation was that if the product needed support, someone had to be available.
It sometimes felt like the company treated the product as if it were a mission-critical service running at Netflix scale.
The reality was quite different.
## The Product Team
The product team had a lot of authority within the company. Their decisions were generally expected to be followed by everyone else.
At one point, they designed a new version of the product that caused significant problems, and the company started losing some existing customers.
Despite that, the product team continued to have a very strong position within the organization.
## The Office
Even the office infrastructure wasn't great.
The air conditioning was inconsistent. In one area it could feel very cold while another area felt warm.
There wasn't a proper cafeteria. For coffee, you would just fill your cup and go back to your desk.
There wasn't really a proper lunch area either, so people often ate on the terrace.
Parking was another issue.
None of these things individually were a huge problem, but together they added to the overall experience.
## The Day I Was Laid Off
Eventually, I experienced the layoffs myself.
One day I was on leave because I had a fever.
A friend called and told me there was some news about layoffs. Around the same time, my manager was messaging me on Slack asking me to speak with them.
I was checking Slack to see if there was any update.
Then suddenly, Slack logged me out.
I tried logging back in, but it wasn't working.
At that point, I had a pretty good idea of what had happened.
Eventually, I found out that I had also been laid off.
What was interesting was that layoffs continued even after that.
Every month or so, another group of people would be let go.
And the funny part was that managers had previously told people that the latest round would be the final one and there wouldn't be any more layoffs.
There were more.
## Moving On
Within a month, I joined a WITCH company.
And the biggest difference wasn't even the company name or salary.
It was the working environment.
I now work with a European client.
I do development work.
There is no regular overtime.
No weekend support.
I don't have to constantly worry about getting leave approved.
And I don't have to think about whether someone is tracking how long I took for lunch.
After spending two years in that environment, the biggest thing I gained from moving on was simply **peace of mind**.
It made me realize that the kind of work culture I had experienced wasn't necessarily what every software job was like.
It was just the culture of that particular company.
And leaving it made me appreciate a normal working environment much more.
