Pros
The best part of January are all the employees. Everyone there is extremely bright, fun, and kind to be around and truly want to help each other succeed even though they are all at or over bandwidth. The company tends to attract people who are all fantastic at their jobs (which may be why none of them stay long but more on that in the Cons section…) If you're willing to work extremely long hours then there's plenty of work to take on - you will truly get to wear 3+ hats. The AI is truly exceptional and could be life-changing if productized properly (but that hasn't happened yet).
Cons
CEO does not trust others, including others on the executive team to the point where she is involved in every minute detail and is the worst micromanager I've ever encountered. If an employee dares debate a viewpoint or push back on a decision, she will decide she no longer likes that employee and from that point on the employee's days will be numbered. Instead of empowering and relying on internal employees, she brings in part-time outside advisors who are not invested in the company's success. CEO is extremely tone-deaf, not self-aware, and a horrendous communicator/leader. She will frequently talk about employees to other employees and has even joked about completely inappropriate topics (will not share as they can be triggering). There is no semblance of work-life balance. The CEO will send a Slack message at 6:30 PM asking you to work on something and present it to her by 9 PM that same day. Then she will send emails at 2, 3, 4 AM and Slack at 7:30 AM asking you to join a meeting right away. She will frequently call people after-hours on their personal phones. Every request is urgent, and if you do not drop everything to work on it immediately the CEO will determine that you are not dedicated and you will no longer have her respect. While the CEO has great ideas and can paint a picture of how the future should be, she has no concept of what is reasonable/manageable, and is not able to elucidate on a specific vision that everyone can understand and get behind. There is no short-to-long-term product focus and decisions related to product/engineering will change on a day-to-day basis, and even on the same day which makes it extremely difficult to work towards any established goals. There is no true mission or company culture, nor does the CEO feel it is important to define these things. There is no real HR leadership and certainly no advocate for employees. CEO/HR leadership will frequently try to short-change employees, like not giving people sick days for COVID leave if they haven't been at the company for more than 3 months. The CEO also asks HR leadership to email a current employee every few weeks and request that they write positive reviews about the company on Glassdoor - obviously employees feel they have to post as key executive team members know they have been contacted, so keep that in mind when reading the 4 & 5 star reviews on here. Since last summer, when there were 25 full-time employees, nearly 20 employees have left, and there are currently fewer than 20 full time employees at the company. Many of those folks who have left are people who worked directly with the CEO. This leaves extra work for the folks who are still here but the CEO rarely replaces the people who have left to help alleviate the load. The average length of time folks stay at the company is ~6 months - because they burn out or can't take working under the CEO's leadership for much longer. Many leave without having anything else lined up because their mental health has been so impacted, and the CEO has no interest in figuring out how to retain employees. She is against town halls or open feedback because of the "negativity" and will frequently sweep employees leaving under the rug. There is no real business plan or budget, and the company is lacking extremely important areas - analytics, finance, in house engineering, etc. Additionally the company uses archaic tools and relies on horribly organized google docs and spreadsheets and refuses to move towards better technology. Above all, the CEO is the CEO, Founder AND Owner, so there is no accountability. Whatever she says, goes, and there's no one who can successfully tell her otherwise.
