I am not in software development but I can second this post regarding HR. They are essentially useless and only protect the company. Also they seem to staff all of HR with young women fresh out of college who - no ill will intended - don't know anything about anything and just parrot back the company line. I am on the business side and whenever any of the projects I supported needed a new programmer etc they would always get the project to give the candidate they had picked to HR after they had been vetted as HR was clueless.
They're not just there to 'protect the company' either, because never in a million years would I consider myself a 'threat' to the company. I went above and beyond every day at work, worked after hours unpaid just so I could make things better for me and my coworkers. Workflows and scripts I wrote and created will be used for years to come but I was absolutely disposable because I asked for too much money and my CIO didn't want to deal with it--even though he had to deal with it regardless since they got rid of me and realized they had to create an entire new position for a lot of the stuff that I did. It's important for us to be aware that executives will also weaponize them given the opportunity. Don't let them take advantage of your naivety like they did me. Follow the employee handbook to a T, don't talk to ANYONE at work about anything other than work. Don't make friends, don't send any messages on teams that you wouldn't be willing to directly tell your manager about. You and your work buddy joke around in teams chat during work? If for some reason HR wanted to fire you at a later date they will review every message and email you sent to find a reason. Something you find to be a joke / acceptable HR will frame as 'inappropriate' and in violation of the employee handbook.
What they used to suspend me:
Using personal MacBook for work (I used Claude code because its only compatible with macOS and linux)
Social Media Policy violations - I had no social media active except LinkedIn. They claimed that I violated the policy because I would post some problem I faced at work and how I fixed it via programming (vague, no PII, nothing specific).
while suspended:
"Inappropriate teams messages sent to coworkers"
