Not as great as it once was - Engineer Shutterfly Employee Review

2.0
Jul 3, 2016
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- Nice people - Flexible hours - Lots of responsibility and learning opportunities, if you want them

Cons

- Too many cooks in the kitchen, I feel like there are more managers and layers of approval than there are engineers. Lots of conflicting directives. - While the hours were flexible, I often found myself working nights and weekends to finish projects in within their unrealistic schedules and constantly shifting priorities. -I feel like the company isn't doing well at the moment. Things like snacks were cut back, employees in all parts of the company are being forced to use their PTO days, the interim CEO said one of the core values of the company should be cutting costs. These all happened around the same time and seem like a red flag to me. I don't feel confident that the new CEO coming in will fix or change this. - They have a hard time retaining good talent. There are some very smart and talented people in the company (and not just in engineering), but around the time I left many of those talented people were leaving as well, getting snatched up by other companies in the Bay Area. Cutting back perks, office location, mediocre compensation, etc all contribute to this. There are a lot of companies in the Bay Area trying to hire, and Shutterfly needs to stay competitive with them. - So. Many. Meetings.

Explore other reviews about Shutterfly

5.0
Jun 20, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

good hours and good learning ability

Cons

N/A it really don't have consequences

2.0
Jul 21, 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- Products are cool. - Company meetings are always upbeat and encouraging.

Cons

- Used to also have great culture and benefits. Now main focus is on cost-cutting and offshoring. - CTO often establishes authority through intimidation and bullying, along the lines of "I want this feature rewritten. How long will it take?" "About a week." "When I was at this other start up, it took 3 days to rewrite a feature. Why can't you do it in 3 days?!" "Well our system is much more complex to update and test and...okay we'll push off all other work and pull all-nighters and weekends and give you in 3 days since it's a CTO ask." "Why do you habitually lie and say a week when you can pull it off in 3 days?!?!" - There now also appears to be a strong ethnic/gender bias in maintaining the technical workforce. - Even when sound bytes sound right, they translate into questionable actions.

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