At my company, we were driven by by high code quality. We would try our best to minimize escalations, we will never release new code on Friday or late in a day because people have lives. We really made sure no one was working late or on weekends. And we were still competitive and profitable business.

Then we get bought by a Fortune 500 company. Slowly new rules come in. Deadline driven projects. Code Quality is no longer important. People are expected to release barely working code just so that we can do a press release. People are working late and on weekends. Code is released on Friday at 5PM because who cares about employee happiness.

The result is smartest people have already left the company. This has led to more escalations and less gatekeepers to prevent bad design decisions. People are constantly leaving. I am still here but I am passively looking, so are most of the remaining people. Right now, market is good, so I might see a pay raise but I have told recruiters, I can take pay cut for a great work-life balance.