Workplace reviews and discussion: 財團法人東元科技文教基金會

1. The employee turnover rate is very high, and many employees casually find an excuse just to leave as quickly as possible.

2. The supervisor pretends to be democratic, saying that there will be a vote, but privately uses LINE to tell a certain colleague to vote for the option the supervisor prefers.

3. The supervisor and deputy supervisor often get into arguments. The supervisor will ask you to take sides, but in reality, you are expected to take the supervisor’s side (even when the deputy supervisor is actually right). This also wastes other colleagues’ working time.

4. The supervisor claims that they will teach you a lot of professional knowledge, but if you have an in-depth conversation with the vendors, you will discover that what the supervisor says is not particularly professional. In practice, that so-called professional knowledge is insufficient for communicating and collaborating with vendors.

5. The supervisor is very good at pressuring vendors. Design drafts are not handled according to industry standards; if the supervisor subjectively decides that something is not good enough, they demand revisions. As a result, employees below have to act as the middlemen and bear the vendors’ anger. Only after I changed career paths did I realize that it is possible to communicate with vendors smoothly and achieve a win-win outcome.

Although most of the points above are negative, this foundation has quietly worked for the preservation of Indigenous cultures and education in remote areas, and has made a certain contribution. Activities such as technology competitions and the TECO Award, which are more oriented toward building a corporate image, will not be discussed here.

In short, the fields and direction in which this foundation works are excellent. You can meet many people from the arts and cultural sectors, as well as many individuals who have been quietly working in various fields in Taiwan.

However, for applicants, it is not enough to talk only about the vision. I believe that the work environment is also an important factor, but currently, this foundation’s work environment does not really allow people to devote themselves wholeheartedly to their work. More time is spent trying to figure out what the supervisor wants and observing the discord and arguments between the supervisor and the executive secretary. If you are genuinely interested in fields such as technology education, Indigenous cultural preservation, or education in remote areas, I recommend looking into other nonprofit organizations that are also working in these areas.