Do not work there! - Anonymous employee Guitar Center Employee Review

1.0
Sep 8, 2018
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Employee discount and some awesome people

Cons

Executive management is out of touch with reality. Very cut throat environment yet they wonder why they receive poor scores on their employee engagement survey in certain categories. Many people there have come up thru the ranks however truly lack the right skill set to be effective. They “teach” Servant Leadership however many executives don’t have a clue on how to execute that mentality with their staff. Instead they speak down to you in front of others and definitely manage by fear. During annual review period they determined the metrics AFTER the year was over which then caused poor ratings on employee reviews and subsequently little or no merit increases. They continue to overwork the staff and poor data integrity and processes makes the job difficult to execute properly - just plain inefficient. They continue to burn thru dedicated employees and it’s just a matter of time before they face legal action for their behavior. HR dept is definitely mismanaged and is not in favor of the employee. I would never recommend working here.

Explore other reviews about Guitar Center

5.0
Jan 9, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Got to work with so many people

Cons

Long hours during holidays were rough

1.0
Apr 21, 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- Plenty of capable individual contributors doing real work. - The brand and the business itself are legitimate — the problems are organizational.

Cons

- Senior leadership is politically driven rather than outcome-driven. Strategic initiatives stall out, and leaders spend more energy assigning or shifting blame than actually diagnosing and fixing problems. - Some parts of the org operate on deference to the top. Honest assessments get softened into whatever narrative leadership wants to hear, which makes real cross-functional work difficult. - Senior leaders do not consistently advocate for their own teams. When things get political, self-preservation takes precedence over backing the people underneath, and capable managers end up exposed.

2
See reviews by: Helpful|Rating|Date|All