1. The monotonous rat infestation has improved recently.

2. The work environment is fairly relaxed, although there are cameras watching you at all times.

3. Snacks are purchased for everyone to enjoy every month, although they often disappear quickly.

4. Most colleagues are around the same age, so there is relatively more to talk about. Everyone also learns from one another (because no one teaches you).

1. The boss’s favorite practice is parachuting in managers, leaving employees with almost no opportunities for advancement.

2. There is no clear system for salary adjustments or compensation and bonus structures. Even if you have worked diligently and devoted yourself to the company for years, unless you proactively ask for a raise, they will act as though they have not noticed. If you do ask, they will require you to provide proof of your contributions. P.S. Seniority is not a reason for a raise; you can work there for several years and still end up in the same place.

3. Internally, sales staff call themselves “consultants,” yet not one of them truly has the professionalism expected of a consultant. They can only rely on “smooth talking” and “making random promises” to sign deals. Once a deal is signed, it becomes the execution department’s responsibility. Consultants are pressured to meet monthly new-business targets, resulting in no consultant genuinely putting effort into looking after their own accounts.

4. Following from the previous two points, consultants can receive new-business and renewal bonuses. However, the PMs responsible for execution have difficulty applying for the renewal or proposal bonuses explicitly stated in the policy. Management simply keeps putting it off. Meanwhile, the design, photography, and web departments that continue doing the actual work have no bonuses to discuss at all. Yet the credit goes to the consultants?

5. You do not need much ability; as long as you have a silver tongue and know how to flatter the boss, you can get a good position in this company. Smoking with the slick-haired senior manager and acting like brothers can also make your time here much more comfortable.

6. Senior management spends all day thinking of other ways to generate cash flow, then gets a bunch of people to waste a great deal of time in meetings discussing them and painting grand visions. But none of these ideas has ever succeeded; they only waste more labor costs and resources.

7. Yet the company takes labor costs extremely seriously. Every month, you have to fill out a “contribution log” measured by the hour so senior management knows what you are doing every hour. Oh, right—smoking is an exception; you do not have to write that down.

8. Although it is supposedly an integrated marketing company, it lacks some of the departments listed among its website service offerings. Because it considers employee costs too high, it simply outsources everything, and if it decides you are not cost-effective, it will ask you to leave. Stop believing in the so-called “our team.”

9. There is not a single IT employee. The network cables are a complete mess, and the company network often has problems.

10. The laptops provided by the company are terrible. To save money, employees are given refurbished second-hand laptops costing only a few thousand dollars. They are slow and frequently break down. Most people would rather use their own laptops for work, and quite a few employees have even purchased equipment at their own expense after joining.

11. There is no training when you join, and no one teaches you how to do things. You can only figure things out yourself and ask colleagues.

12. Employee turnover is extremely high because everyone can personally experience how rotten this company is. The company does not care anyway—you are merely disposable chopsticks; they can always find another person. This creates a vicious cycle.

13. The ideas of employees in the frontline execution departments never reach senior management. When problems are reported to superiors, they are either blocked by department managers or ignored by senior managers who feel the issues could be detrimental to themselves.

14. The slick-haired manager’s biggest taboo is employees forming little cliques. No one is allowed to dislike anyone or say bad things about anyone; if discovered, you will be forced out. Yet there have also been cases where he forced people out simply because he disliked them. He spends all day laughing and joking behind closed doors in meetings with a specially organized team, so people who do not know better might think they are the so-called clique.

15. The boss and the slick-haired manager distrust employees intensely, assuming that the moment employees are out of their sight, they must be slacking off.

16. There were three cases of late salary payments over the past year, including one time when salaries were paid three days late. The boss never informed employees in advance or explained the reason. I heard that in previous years there were also cases of half salaries being paid before the New Year and year-end bonuses being delayed by three months.

17. Do not particularly expect a year-end bonus or bonuses for the three major holidays, because everything depends on the boss’s mood. The amount paid also depends on the boss’s mood and impression of you. Even if you work conscientiously and always consider the company’s interests, you will not receive more than colleagues with less seniority who are better at flattering the boss. If you happen to be planning to resign, any bonuses you would otherwise have received will all be saved, because the boss is unwilling to reward departing employees. Regardless of how long you have worked there or whether you were laid off, it all amounts to nothing. Oh, and the company even saves money by not giving everyone an opening-of-business red envelope.

18. Employees are asked to write fake interview experiences or fake reviews on job-search websites and well-known discussion forums, so take them with a grain of salt. The Google ratings are basically also boosted internally. In interviews, the most important thing is how enthusiastic you are about the job. Your actual ability barely matters, but being a blank slate is best because then they do not have to offer too high a salary 👍🏻.

19. The domestic and overseas employee trips and employee dinners listed on 104 basically do not exist. Getting paid on time is already a blessing.

20. In the eyes of Cross-Border Digital, the value of marketing is how much you can contribute each hour and how much profit you can generate for the company. It is the so-called quantity-over-quality approach: what matters is the amount of execution, not the quality of the work carried out.