The negative glassdoor reviews are 100% correct - Anonymous employee balena Employee Review

1.0
Aug 14, 2020
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- Very good life/work balance - Great product with lot's of potential - Good talent in the team, a very diverse stack of products. - Above the market salaries

Cons

Read the negative Glassdoor reviews, they are as close to the truth as it gets. It's a micro-management hell with a flat-hierarchy which means that for 95% of decisions, they must be accepted by a group of 3 people. From the tech stack to technical details. It's nuts really. Everybody knows what is happening, but nobody speaks because the pay is just very good. Nobody is really happy, it's funny really how many people reach out one to another to verify that they are not alone-or mad. It's by design, the management team understands what is happening, they just don't have the prior experience to effectively manage a company of this size and maturity. They are well-intended, just not equipped, or willing to grow.

Explore other reviews about balena

5.0
Jan 14, 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Very supportive team and culture.

Cons

Time zones can get a bit tricky.

5.0
May 18, 2023
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- Work on what you love with room to explore your (relevant) interests (albeit within the company's best interests) - Culture is highly understanding, cooperative, and supportive - Employees respect each other - Management respects employees and recognizes their efforts - Employees' personal time is respected - Freedom to choose your own schedule - Management is open/non-secretive

Cons

- The remote environment makes it possible to get siloed, but the siloing could be avoided with a little effort to communicate with others and join meetings/open offices - It may take a bit to complete a feature/improvement (pending reviews, etc.) because everyone else also has their hands full with other features/improvements. Plus potential re-iterations provoked by reviews and other changes of product (a consequence of the long lifecycle of a PR). However, this is something that is actively being improved, with the company mindset recently having moved towards trying to get polished features out sooner in order to get feedback and iterate on them. - Have to do support shifts which (although beneficial for learning about the product) can be a bit tedious/boring at times

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