Pluspunten
You get a lot of personal and vacation time off (20 days vacation time, 10 days personal/sick time), more than most companies would give. There are a lot of social events the company organizes, such as happy-hour every Fridays, holiday parties, picnics, and fun outdoor events. Benefits are good and they are flexible with employees working from home/working remotely.
Minpunten
Cogstate is a toxic, cliquey, stressful environment run by leaders with serious communication issues and lack of direction. Employees with true talent, purpose, and hopes to actually succeed in the company are taken advantage of, thrown into constant change, and misled by lies and countless trails of broken promises by upper management leaving you feeling undervalued, underappreciated, and used. The job responsibilities you are given are highly administrative and you will end up stuck in a rut with work that does not fit your strengths, skillset, goals or educational background. Any of your requests to be given more challenging or better work will be ignored, or rather promised with no intention of being followed through. Whether you have a master’s, bachelor’s, Ph.D., your value and experience will not be taken seriously because the job responsibilities you are assigned don’t utilize your degree under any circumstances. I’ve seen employees with bachelor’s degrees with non-relevant experience put in higher positions over highly prestigious employees with doctorates. The decisions that this company makes is remarkable, because it makes absolutely no sense. Trust me when I say that this department will make you doubt your self-worth, lower your self-esteem, and cause a downstream of negativity within the team. The company lacks resources to invest in the latest platforms, technology, software, etc and for this reason it is seriously behind its competitors, causing an overwhelming increase in workload and uptick in assignments that you feel will be completely useless to the company later on when better platforms are implemented. Upper management is terrible and could care less about your needs; They are only concerned about bottom line. Interdepartmental communication is extremely poor and no one is on the same page when it comes to project deadlines, workflow, plans, protocols, etc. The company is highly political, and employees with no relevant experience or education get promoted to do better work over the people with real talents because of the amount of favoritism that exists. All the work you do goes unnoticed and there is no opportunity for growth or advancement in the company. Lastly, it mimics a high school environment. There's lot of gossip in the workplace, co-workers are fake and unprofessional, immature, there are lots of clicks which make it hard for new people to build good relationships because they feel left out. I would not recommend this company at all for people with “a dream” because it will quickly turn into a nightmare. Good Luck! 😊