Toxic Culture Enabled by Leadership and Ignored by Management - Anonymous employee HackerOne Employee Review

1.0
May 23, 2025
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Genuinely hard to identify any lasting positives given the cultural environment. Some individual contributors were friendly and competent.

Cons

• Toxic workplace culture was either supported by upper management or ignored entirely. • Rampant “not my job” attitude made collaboration nearly impossible—even when tasks clearly aligned with corporate responsibilities. • Feedback was poorly received; unless it was overtly negative, many employees assumed everything was fine and acted surprised when issues came up. • Interpersonal behavior was highly inconsistent. Colleagues (and sometimes managers) were friendly one day and dismissive the next, which made the environment feel unstable and untrustworthy. • Leadership failed to set a tone of accountability or foster any meaningful professional development or team unity.

Explore other reviews about HackerOne

5.0
May 4, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

-Very clear interview process and onboarding steps. -Great benefits.

Cons

None that I can think of.

2.0
Jan 8, 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- The coworkers are genuinely amazing: smart, kind, and deeply supportive. Many people truly care about doing the right thing and helping each other succeed. - The mission is meaningful. Supporting the global community of ethical hackers is powerful, and the work has real impact on improving security across the internet.

Cons

- Since the arrival of the new CEO, nearly the entire C-suite has been replaced in under a year. This has created an environment of fear, risk aversion, and excessive CYA behavior. - HackerOne used to value transparency and open dialogue. “An honest question gets an honest answer” was more than a motto—it was lived. Today, people are afraid to ask honest questions, and answers are often vague corporate speak rather than real explanations. - A new AI engineer role was created with a pay band roughly 40% higher than existing software engineers. In practice, some software engineers are doing the same work for significantly less pay, which has caused frustration and morale issues. - The company once had a strong, people-first culture. That culture has eroded to the point where layoffs have occurred while employees were on maternity leave. - A newly hired VP in engineering focused on AI appears more interested in empire-building and optics with the C-suite than in empowering teams. Accountability is demanded without corresponding agency, and blame is often pushed downward when decisions don’t work out.

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