Toxic leadership - Senior Product Manager Motional Employee Review

1.0
May 26, 2021
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Nice offices, decent perks. Used to have smart individuals but quickly leaving or worse getting fired.

Cons

Leadership across the board is terrible. My specific leadership is amazingly incompetent and nonexistent, had no idea what is going on, doesn't understand our product and thus could not get a grasp of the whole team. Product leadership overall has no clear vision or strategy and daily operating for survival while promoting terrible politics, high ego and a backstabbing culture. Proudly silencing experienced individuals for calling out bad practices or worse shown the door. Shamelessly making an example out of them!

avatar
Motional Response
5y
Thanks for your feedback. I’m sorry to hear you aren’t having the positive experience we want for all our employees. Regarding your comments about leadership, I will respectfully disagree. We have a talented team across all levels, with some of the most innovative colleagues in the industry. This includes a strong bench of world-leading robotics, autonomy and engineering experts at the leadership level. That doesn’t mean we get it right every time -- but testing, learning, and iterating are all part of the development process as we grow as a company. That being said, I’m a big believer in open communication and feedback. If you feel like you aren’t getting what you need, please don’t hesitate to reach out so we can set up time to discuss and hopefully improve your experience. Thank you again for your feedback. Dave Helton Vice President, Programs & Systems

Explore other reviews about Motional

5.0
May 25, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

State of the art technology

Cons

Changes in leadership and org structure

4.0
Jul 4, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Excellent place to learn and grow a career. In software, especially cloud and data products, very kind and collaborative culture of people who work hard to learn and grow. Very good benefits package. Lots of room to have autonomy and to be a builder and a maintainer. Leadership team requires that promotion cases demonstrate real business impact, which makes it a good environment to learn how to be impactful.

Cons

Significant portion of company located in Singapore can be awkward for a few select roles. The company is past the funnest startup phases and needs to be aligned with frugal, fiscally conservative safety-first culture of South Korean Hyundai (parent company). Equity package looks inflated on paper by about 3-4x (the stock options are little more than a tax complication). Lots of red tape. Company moves slow. Cross-functional nature of domain-scoped teams requires program management and a bit of bureaucracy to get many things done. Leadership leverages the glass ceiling effect very effectively, which can have the unfortunate effect of orienting engineers to business problems instead of engineering.

1
See reviews by: Helpful|Rating|Date|All