The long hours have turned into some masochistic badge of honor.
My company is in some extreme cost savings mode. We've been exceeding financial projections for about five years now, so all I can imagine is that they want to set aside a pool of cash to buy someone, and they've been buying back shares like crazy. As a result, every single department is under-staffed. Tempers are short, service quality to our clients is down, and morale is terrible. Everyone is overworked and tries to push their responsibilities onto other departments. We have no leadership on process or best practices, but our CEO has created nine CO positions in the last couple of years. Each one of them earning 100-200 times what one of us rank and file earn. There isn't a person in my department who works less than 50 hours a week. Most are in the 60-70 range. *Every week. All salaried. There's a hiring freeze going on a year now that's always set to expire one month from whenever you ask about it.
For comparison, my biggest account - a Fortune 50 client - 15 years ago, had three times the staff on it, and those staff members only worked on that account. Now? We do twice the work with one third the staff, and every single one of us is on multiple Fortune 500 accounts on the side. And it's not the technology enabling this; none of our systems are more modern than basic email. But the pay is worse, adjusted for inflation. Bonuses are gone. The company hasn't given raises in four years. No more company cars, country club memberships, or even sports tickets to entertain clients. 401k matching is down. Education benefits are almost gone. Insurance and investment options are worse. We don't even have the nice office in the city anymore; the company moved to some shitty suburb in a cheap, 90s-built mid-rise with walls like paper and conference room doors that don't even stay closed. Three weeks vacation is standard, and even that pittance is hard to actually use up. This is a company with $13 billion/year in revenue!
I had a great job interview a couple of weeks ago. I expect an offer any day now. I plan to leave professionally and not burn any bridges, but I can't fucking wait to turn in my resignation.