Lack of direction, no autonomy, too much time spent fighting fires.
Pros
- Cool product (when it works) - Catered lunches - 401k recently added (no matching but this is normal for a start up this size) - Unlimited PTO, but don’t expect to be able to fully unplug
Cons
- CEO can’t get out of his or the company’s way. He acts as an IC on far too many things, constantly taking more on, and is only ever a blocker to the progress others are trying to make. He talks about “process” as if it’s a dirty word, and never consults stakeholders when making sweeping changes (product, strategy, organization, etc) that take us all by surprise. Provides no actual leadership and is quickly losing internal trust. - No internal communication. Things are released to customers with zero comms internally. Big announcements are made around things like re-orgs, but details never come so everyone feels in limbo. No insight into financial health of company, revenue potential of customers, etc. A LOT of back door dealings. If you’re in the in-crowd you might know more, but if you’re not then good luck. - Very little diversity. Few women at the company, exec team is all white men. - Toxic culture around disagreeing or sharing alternate points of view. Many people are afraid to speak up for fear of retribution. As mentioned, CEO makes unilateral decisions and does not handle disagreements well, or take other opinions/ viewpoints into account. - Lots of product issues over last several months. Everyone being pulled in a million directions. No clear path forward. Every day feels like unbridled chaos and most team members seem increasingly burned out. - Leadership tends to be suspiciously absent when things are on fire and lets everyone else take the heat. - Enormous amount of disorganization internally. No visibility into what is being worked on so you may do the same thing as someone else, or work on something for weeks/months that gets cut with no explanation or communication.
