Workplace reviews and discussion: UIUX_Cafe_碩太網路有限公司

1. Excellent colleagues: The colleagues are easy to get along and communicate with. In addition, almost everyone is a designer, so we can learn from one another and share experiences and new knowledge related to design.

2. Comfortable company environment: There is a kitchen where you can cook, a lounge filled with beanbag chairs, and a foosball table. After work, you can play with your colleagues. In addition, everyone is provided with a 27-inch Mac, which makes arranging designs on a large screen excellent and efficient.

3. Well-known design products: The projects the company takes on are well-known and sufficiently challenging. Seeing the completed designs used by many people gives you a strong sense of accomplishment.

4. Experience with collaborative design: Multiple people collaborate on the same project here, so you develop many approaches to file management and division of work. This helps improve your collaboration skills.

5. Fast pace: Due to the influence of the company culture, you can experience highly efficient design methods and refine your proficiency with design software.

In terms of design

(These are probably issues commonly faced by companies that take on outsourced projects.)

1. Limited growth: The company is currently a start-up outsourcing design company. The primary goal here is to “finish projects on time,” rather than to improve the product user experience. Toward the later stages, the company basically adopts whatever changes the client says they want.

2. The company does not value UX: The relationship with clients is more like that of an outsourced provider producing screens and prototypes. Neither we nor the client contact has decision-making authority, so we often receive change requests from within the client’s company, most of which leave no room for discussion.

In terms of company management

1. No organizational structure: There are only employees and the boss (who is also the manager of all projects). It sounds equal and positive, but when the manager is also the boss... you will understand why this is not necessarily a good thing as you continue reading.

2. The boss is quite inexperienced at handling personnel matters, for example:

- Does not explain things clearly during interviews, saying to start working first and discuss things later; if you are deemed unsuitable, you are asked to leave.

- Promises a salary increase, then forgets about it and later denies having made the promise.

- Reassigns positions without warning; if displeased, immediately replaces someone without first discussing it with or informing the employee.

3. Underreporting salaries for labor and health insurance: From the company’s founding through August, salaries were consistently underreported for labor and health insurance purposes. This was raised once at the end of June, and the company said it would make an adjustment. The employment contract also clearly stated that insurance would be provided at the legally required level. However, it was later discovered that the insured salary level for July had not been adjusted as stipulated in the contract. The explanation given was an accounting error.

Manager (who is also the boss)

1. No management experience: Before founding the company, the boss had no prior experience as a manager.

2. Poor emotional management: The pressure of taking on outsourced projects is intense. Unable to process their emotions, the boss starts feeling that employees have it too easy and becomes trapped in various negative emotions.

3. Emotional standards for evaluating employee performance: The boss says that the standard for judging whether employees are good or bad is “a sense of trust”—in other words, it depends on their mood and has nothing to do with professional ability. This makes it difficult for employees to know what standards to follow. If the boss likes you, things can go very well for you (but they will not like you forever); if they do not like you, they freeze you out and privately complain about you to other employees.

4. No established policies; all standards depend on mood: The boss currently handles employees taking overly long breaks by verbally urging everyone to be more self-aware, proactive, and considerate of the company and the boss. When an employee proactively asked whether the company had rules specifying the length of the lunch break, the boss said they did not want to establish one.

5. Dislikes design discussions: When colleagues discuss design together, the boss becomes unhappy and hopes to reduce the discussion time or the number of participants. Discussions between employees and the boss can easily make the boss irritated, and the boss has repeatedly said they want employees simply to follow instructions.

6. Controls speech: When employees mention that the deadline is too tight or that a client’s demands are overwhelming, they are called in for a meeting and told not to affect the team’s atmosphere in this way. When the boss is under pressure, they seek emotional reassurance or call in employees they believe are slacking, seriously affecting everyone’s mood at work.

I have heard it said that a manager’s strengths and weaknesses account for more than half of your work quality. Personally, I believe the impact of this factor is extremely significant, so anyone considering working here should think carefully.