These are simply my opinions based on my short and eventful time at Faithlife. After the purchase by the PE Firm things have become more "corporate" the culture is shifting at the top and a lot of rank and file employees feel squeezed between the "Vision" of the company and the reality of the business. Faithlife is a for Profit Business that happens to serve a niche Tech market, Churches and Bible study enthusiasts. PE investment and subsequent interference with operations feels like a long term pump and dump. This isn't Bain Capital, but PE has learned to adapt and ultimately wants to see a return on investment. Some customers have noticed the change and worry about the longevity of the company. Significant Executive turnover since I started. No real sense of stability. Rank and file seem to bear the brunt of executive failures while executives bear little to no consequences. In Sept. 2022 there was a 10% layoff company wide. I understand the reasoning for the layoffs, a lot of redundancy and misjudging of the markets factor in. It seems that employees were given a good severance at least. People have continued to leave since the layoffs and are not being replaced, the workload has continued to increase for remaining employees without any additional pay. A lot of salaried employees were moved to hourly and some feel this was financially motivated. HR seems to get bogged down in bureaucracy and forget that these are real people going through the ups and downs of life. From talking with employees that have been around for years, in the past the company always put the health and well being of the employee first, now the penny pinching has drastically reduced those benefits. Anonymized employee surveys with no sense of direction. We do the surveys and nothing seems to change. Low participation probably helps keep the data anonymous. Who wants to work at a company where you feel like you will be persecuted or retaliated against for your opinion? In a recent company meeting there were a lot of questions around compensation because we just finished our annual review cycles. I am paraphrasing but an executive said "We don't negotiate salary, take your services elsewhere if you expect higher pay." Another longer tenured executive had to back pedal that response. Myself and a few others witnessed an employee and their spouse being sexually harassed and humiliated at a corporate event by two executives. Surprising in the moment, but looking back on it now, not at all surprising. "Rules for thee, not for me" seems to be a reigning mentality now. Corporate values that few at the top follow. They say the right words, but there is no conviction so the words feel hollow. Lack of diversity. In 2023 with the prevalence of remote work there is no excuse.
