Company that's struggled with growth and unaddressed toxicity. - Anonymous employee Zonar Systems Employee Review

2.0
Apr 1, 2021
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

People are mostly wonderful. Everyone works hard and collaborates well for the most part. They've seemed to navigate through the pandemic well so far, with minimal effect to the workforce.

Cons

Even though the employees are great, there is quite a bit of toxicity that exists between departments because of a great lack of understanding of the tasks handled by other teams. The train of thought is to pass things along in the hopes wherever it lands can figure it out. There seems to be a lack of training on the sales reps especially. Supposedly, their emphasis is to "sell, sell, sell." So they just focus on bagging a sale without thinking about any follow-through or if the sale is being done correctly. If any errors occur, they are quick to pass the buck off to other teams for clean up. Then they're praised by management for an excellent #onezonar effort, when in reality so many others scramble behind the scenes to ensure that sale doesn't fall through. It's unfortunate that turnover has not stopped there for some time and have lost some great members. Overall, there also seems to be a struggle with the "growth spurt" that Zonar is experiencing. Processes are still pretty non-existent with most seemingly satisfied continuing to work with tribal knowledge. That leaves a lack of consistency with pricing/packages presented to customers. A new pricing model was recently rolled out, likely to address this issue, but results were still pending to be seen. Communication is also a struggle, some teams are left to confirm process changes which tends to contribute to the toxicity because the questions get perceived as a "dumb question" because it's assumed that everyone already knows.

Explore other reviews about Zonar Systems

5.0
Jun 18, 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Love the Energy Work Remote Reorg is painful, but future is bright

Cons

Work Remote. Its a plus and a negative as it is sometimes hard to build camaraderie.

1.0
Jun 11, 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

There are still some genuinely good people at Zonar. A lot of talented, hard-working employees are still trying to do right by the customers and keep things moving despite everything going on around them. At one point, Zonar had a strong identity and a real place in the pupil transportation space. The company understood school bus and student transportation customers in a way that not many others did, and that history is still something worth acknowledging.

Cons

Zonar is not the company it used to be. Over the last several years, the company has been gutted by waves of layoffs, constant restructuring, outsourcing, and leadership decisions that rarely seem to make sense to the people actually doing the work. Morale has been destroyed. Teams have been cut down over and over again, and employees are expected to keep delivering with fewer people, less support, and no clear direction. One of the biggest mistakes was refusing to innovate and abandoning the pupil transportation customers that made Zonar what it was. Those customers were the foundation of the company. Instead of continuing to invest in that space, leadership seemed to lose interest and chase whatever new direction sounded good at the time. Those customers took the hint and started leaving too. The company now feels like it has no real product direction. Instead of building strong Zonar products, it feels like a bunch of other companies’ products have been white-labeled, stapled together, and sold as one platform. Internally, it is confusing. Externally, customers can see it too. A lot of work has also been shifted offshore, especially to Colombia. That may save money on paper, but it has also come with the loss of experienced employees, lost institutional knowledge, and a general feeling that the company is being dismantled instead of rebuilt. Leadership is also a huge part of the problem. The CEO’s direction feels erratic, short-sighted, and disconnected from what employees and customers are actually experiencing. The focus seems to be on cutting costs and chasing whatever looks good in the moment, not on building a stable company or supporting the people who kept it alive for years. Good employees can only hold things together for so long when the strategy is broken, the culture is gone, and the customer base that built the company has been pushed away.

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