Toxic leadership and culture drive away talented employees - Management Consultant Skewb Employee Review

Good pay and good travel expenses

Skewb runs on a buddy system, and almost every other problem flows from that. Proximity to senior leadership and to a small circle of insiders determines who gets the interesting work, who gets recognition, who gets included in the conversations that actually matter, and who gets protected when things go wrong. If you are inside that circle, you hear the unofficial requests, the gossip, and the early signals about where things are heading, and you can position yourself accordingly. If you are outside it, you are effectively invisible regardless of input. Contributions are quietly absorbed by people closer to leadership, recognition flows upward and sideways within the in-group, and those outside it are left without acknowledgement, and without inclusion. Office politics and personal agendas have become more visible rather than less, and speculation and rumour now fill the space that should be occupied by clear communication and transparent decision-making. Taken together, the unevenly distributed insider knowledge and the public dismissal of mental health and pace concerns function as attacks on the people doing the steady, unglamorous work. The in-group benefits from advance information, informal influence, and the protection of leadership; those outside it are left to absorb the consequences of decisions they had no part in, and are then characterised as struggling because they aren't good enough rather than because the system is rigged against them. The culture around wellbeing reinforces this. There is an unspoken expectation to be available beyond reasonable hours. Mental health is treated as a personal performance issue rather than a signal that something in the system is wrong — concerns are seen as a sign of individual inadequacy rather than something to be taken seriously or examined for root causes. Token gestures are held up as evidence of a strategy, but they do nothing to address the underlying causes — decisions, commitments, and deadlines set at the top with little meaningful consultation, and a persistent gap between what leadership promises and what proves realistic in practice. The result is a recurring pattern of commitments that cannot realistically be met, leaving the company looking unprepared and unprofessional externally, while internally creating pressure that those further from leadership are expected to absorb without complaint. Leadership seems genuinely unaware of, or uninterested in, the toll any of this takes. In a recent all-company briefing, a senior member of the exec team described Glassdoor reviews as a "cockshy" method of giving feedback — a comment visible in the Q&A long enough for a large portion of the company to see it before it was deleted. It captures the prevailing attitude towards employee feedback better than any review could: dismissive, contemptuous, and entirely uninterested in what the dismissal itself signals. HR is not a route to resolution. The function is widely perceived as existing to protect the company and senior leadership rather than to support employees, and raising concerns rarely results in meaningful action. The result is a company where a small inner circle thrives and everyone else is gradually worn down, professionally sidelined, excluded from the conversations that matter, and told, when they struggle, that the problem is them.

As others have mentioned, the pros are limited to free coffee and lunch

The mere fact that tomorrow is Monday is deeply frustrating. The bullying culture and the detached, carefree approach of management fail to acknowledge how much self-control it takes to operate under what often feels like dictatorial leadership. When well over half of the workforce appears to be either actively trying to leave or staying purely for financial survival, that should be a clear indicator of deeper issues within the business. Outside of senior leadership, very few people genuinely enjoy working here. This is not immediately visible because there is no genuinely safe or effective space to provide honest feedback. It is difficult not to question the authenticity of many high-rating reviews, as they often appear disconnected from the wider employee experience and are largely reflective of leadership or people team perspectives. Leadership promotes the idea of a “family”, but this only applies if you fully conform. That means being a people pleaser, highly extroverted, rarely sick, available during holidays, frequently present in the office, doing as you are told, and consistently engaging with certain OPCO members who can significantly influence outcomes that affect you. These so-called family privileges can disappear quickly once an employee questions decisions, challenges ways of working, raises concerns about burnout, or decides to leave. Competence may help you get hired, but it does not protect your wellbeing or job security unless you fully assimilate into the company’s narrative and unwritten rules. Working at Skewb requires being able to withstand a lack of support from direct management, senior leadership, and HR in particular, which is widely perceived as prioritising the protection of the employer over employee welfare, while silently allowing bullying within the workplace. There is an ongoing lack of accountability and meaningful improvement, which may be influenced by the fact that this is not a consumer-facing business, meaning external reviews and employee wellbeing have little impact on revenue.