Pros
I've been waiting to write this review and I hope CEO George Nunez sees it. Lets start... This company has a few things that are excellent in conception but poor in execution. Pro's here The pod system in the Center Of Excellence (COE/Training facility) is excellent in providing an environment that allows new programmers and even non programmers room to grow in skill, without literally any pressure. CEO George Nunez gets a bad wrap for being too aggressive, I'd instead say he's a very passionate individual about QA. The facility in itself is a nice place, they've invested in a gaming center with all the systems, pool table, ping pong, free snacks and coffee. Literally this place is a heaven if your coming into the industry, and that's even in comparison to legacy large corporations that lack company culture. Company is focused on training, and retention. At least their Wiki is solidly documented and resourceful. Due to the contract business modal there's lots of exposure to many different frameworks, tools, and languages. Granted the in-house tools could be better but it's a small company cut them some slack. Mentioning the contract business modal, you have hands-on exposure to multiple large and growing companies. Ticketmaster's QA is here. Thats a big deal if your coming into the industry. You could find your true passion here and turn that into a valuable skill, whether its Full Stack Web, Front End, Back End, or different platforms, the opportunity is yours. This place has an interesting turnover rate (Quitting /Promotion), both seem to happen a-lot with no apparent reasoning. Slightly stiff flexible schedule so you get 3 options. 6a-3p,9a-6p,12p-9p. GreenFramework is a neat addition to marginally offset low pay. Over all... the people that they have maintained (Tenured) have love for the company and culture and are there to help. They promote the learning environment, but learning is on the individual so there's never any pressure. This is a place where you could blend in and do nothing for months without notice and collect, or excel so fast that your forced to look at the things they are doing horribly. Perception is in the eye of the beholder.
Cons
I told myself that once I quit I would be fair and honest cause they need a humble review. This is that. The pod system is framed as paired programming, but here's what really happens. In the facility there seems to be a divide between Programmers(shortlist) and the unknown. The environment caters to the unknown, if you have any sort of skill you will quickly find yourself training others and no longer learning. You'll feel like a babysitter watching the house fire set by the oldest kid who wanted to cook. It's all over the place to be frank. There's essentially no accountability in the POD, so the programmers do the real work and the unknown do almost nothing but manual testing and writing emails. In the COE they assume and treat you like the unknown, imagine being a Wolf being herded with the sheep. Frustrating. I've literally seen individuals BS work their entire lifespan of SQAsquared and they're open about it. It's like the system has the potential to truly uplift individuals but its execution honestly hinders the less confident and makes them more dormant. Why? Well thats because when you join a pod there is no direct hierarchy, it seems as if everybody knows just a little of something and never enough of anything. The pod lacks accountability, and real value other than to aid in grunt work or train the unknown if you come into this business with Technical Expertise, and because there's no pressure, a few people just rot. Promotion seems 80% political 20% skill based. George is aggressive about his business modal, maybe a little too much, maybe not enough. See you have to be open to change and yes the modal has potential but it needs managers and middle managers, and then supervisors to increase your throughput. There's tons of wasted energy here, you could build the wall with it. Training is/was non existent. I mentioned the in house Wiki earlier which is essentially your training. Its kinda pointless as Google exist but specific technical information on the Clients and Client's protocols is helpful. Speaking of Client's and the Pod system, and frameworks. The shuffling around is extremely in-efficient, in the real programming world people acquire specialities and grow within a subset. The dynamic of being shifted around every so often sounds great in thought but in reality they should make those decisions based on Language/Framework and not based on arbitrary on the whim decisions. I mentioned finding passion, you can't do that without a base of confident ability. Give the unknown real programming lessons, stop throwing them on the deep end without even the basics of how to stroke. At bear minimum teach them to float comfortably in one environment and then see if they can't float in the river of knowledge. Your literally killing your majority, turning some into Micheal Phelp's, and retaining the few that learned to float. On the topic of retention, the turnover rate is high and employee moral is low. Honestly the COE isn't that bad if your a swimmer. But imagine swimming wit variable weights everyday, you could drown too. I would like to go on but I won't, cause again it's only bad if you've never been in the pool. If you can float you'll probably promote, if you can swim you'll probably Quit, and if your drowning its probably because your in a pool called the COE. I quit SQA, and within ONE MONTH I now make 6 figures as an Android Engineer, but I had that skill before I got there, being there only made me recognize my value.