Pros
**The sheer volume of positive reactionary reviews (a few of which are almost certainly fake/planted) that popped up LITERALLY overnight in response to a single less-than-stellar review of the company is staggering (and probably says more about the company than any review can express).** Just wanted to provide a different perspective, and attempt to offer a balanced review with information that I wish I’d known about Guidebook before I applied. Hope this is helpful to any potential job seekers out there. I met some awesome people at Guidebook, many of whom I kept in touch with after I quit. The people were definitely what I looked forward to going into work each day. The two stars are for the great people. As mentioned in some of the other reviews, one perk is a stocked snack/kitchen area, which means that you won’t starve (even if you aren’t being paid that well). There is also a wide variety of surrounding food options for both offices. There is flexibility to pursue projects that you are interested in, but as others have mentioned, the caveat is that it is completely and totally up to you to wrangle together the resources and time to see them through (I’ve noticed that this frequently comes at the expense of work/life balance). There is no limit on vacation/sick time, which is nice, although in retrospect, this is also a smart business move that allows Guidebook to NOT to have to pay out vacation time/balances when people quit.
Cons
Compensation is below market rate. There’s no two ways about it. I feel like this was especially true for fresh college grads who lacked negotiation skills and/or were eager/desperate to land a full-time job. I understand that compensation is generally lower at startups, but there is low, and then there is grossly below market rate... Emails that went out to certain teams, as well as to the entire company, achieved the exact opposite of the intended effect. Rather than motivating people and making them want to work harder, these emails demoralized and frustrated employees who were already giving 110%. For instance, one email that was sent out to the entire company listed a select group of people who were called out as the “hardest” workers. This ended up being rather awkward for the people on the list, and maddening/frustrating for those left off of it. This incident was detrimental to team morale, and made the atmosphere in the office tense/uncomfortable for awhile. I understand that the intent was to motivate the team, but the delivery/execution/tone was completely off-putting and counterproductive. I can only imagine how it must have felt for the people who scanned the list and saw that everyone on their team was listed...except for them. It definitely left a bitter taste in people’s mouths, especially as people grew increasingly frustrated with the low comp and the long hours. The whole thing was ludicrous and demoralizing, and I don’t think a single positive came out of it. Communication across teams could use some work. It seems like the sales team is consistently selling features that the engineers can’t reasonably deliver in the promised timeframe.
