This all went down about 5 months ago. I left the job after 6 months. I want to vent because I haven’t discussed this with anyone except with my wife.
Joined a start up because I wanted to be an early member of a growing company. I was number 7 in the door and 2nd on the commercial side, after the commercial director and company co-founder. This guy was my line manager, and while I was in the UK, as was the rest of the company, he was on the east coast of the US.
The red flags:
Month 1-3
The two founders were from a big company. I was the first person in the door at the new company, that hadn’t worked for their previous company. Made me feel like an outsider from day one.
The training was hilariously bad. I went straight into role play with my line manager when I hadn’t received any information about the products. When I repeatedly asked for information about the products, I got it month 5 of my 6 months at the company.
Condescending technical director/ co-founder. Spent the entire time proving that he smarter than me. He would lecture me about the products, rather than show them to me and let me interact with them. Fair play to him, he probably is smarter and he probably didn’t want me at the company.
Almost all of my daily meetings with my line manager were at the end of his day. Meaning I was staying up until midnight, as they were work meetings they should have been during his work day at an appropriate time for me.
We went to an international trade show where I pulled in great leads for the company. They all went to the commercial director.
At the Christmas party I was introduced to a new face at the company. She had worked with them at their previous company for 20 years and was coming in directly above me and being installed in a directorship at the company, thus cutting off any career progression for me.
Month 4-6
I had been working on a large account with one of the worlds biggest diagnostic companies. As soon as they were ready to pull the trigger and proceed. The account was taken away from me by the commercial director.
Another international trade show was taking place. I was not even asked to go, with the new hire going, and I was asked to arrange meetings for the new hire at the trade show.
I was asked to renegotiate my terms, with a 50% pay cut. Most likely to make space in the budget for their new hire. I was advised my new role was to cold call and pull in new leads.
Discussed my anxieties about this with HR, who I found out is the technical directors father in law.
*Since leaving the company *
I’m much happier now, back at my old company on improved terms and more experienced. I have been following the progression of this start up. They have hired 5 new people, most likely due to the massive diagnostic account I brought in.