A great combination of impact and profit driven organization - Product Design Lead Cozero (Germany) Employee Review

- Cozero has some very good employees, both as people and as professionals. - It is actually a nice place to work at because you have flexibility in your schedule

- Salaries are average to low - Benefits apart from the flexi work are non existent - The product is a mess, constant bugs, features done and then never touched again, there are fires constantly whenever users try to make use of Cozero - Management is just inexperienced to say the least, maybe they provided value at the start but now they are the ones holding back the company - Management does not listen to the people they hire. The amount they listen is proportional the status of the person they hire, classical statusist. - There are many people leaving which cannot be a good sign for the rest of us - Customer care is weird, they ignore some customers but put incredible effort to satisfy some of the tiniest requests from others -

I worked at Cozero for a year, and like many others, it only took me a few months to realize the significant mistake I had made. The tool itself and most of the team are genuinely amazing. In fact, it was the people I worked with who made it so hard for me to say goodbye despite the difficult circumstances. Cozero has done an excellent job in both hiring great talent and creating a remarkable product.

However, they have failed catastrophically in how they treat their employees and in retaining them. The average tenure at the company seems to be around a year. While the founders attribute this to generational trends, this explanation doesn’t hold up. Other startups, even within the same industry, manage to retain employees from this so-called "generation" for three years or more. The core issue at Cozero lies with the two main founders. While they might come across as kind and approachable on the surface, my experience and that of many others was quite the opposite. They treat employees poorly, often through passive-aggressive behavior, micromanagement, and constant criticism. Many people I spoke to left feeling devalued and manipulated. The leadership style is toxic: they are unwilling to delegate even minor decisions, refuse to take any form of feedback, and create an environment that leads to burnout. Their inability to empower their team or trust others to take the lead has left a trail of demoralized employees. Looking back, working at Cozero was the biggest mistake of my career. While the product and the team are exceptional, the toxic leadership makes it a place where good people can’t thrive.