I have nothing to gain (and don’t want anything to gain) by writing this. I just want to give prospective employees the real talk to the fake news spewing if you read any five-star review. Here it goes:
'You have to get used to the breakneck pace of TripActions.' Yes, this is true. But here’s the part they don’t tell you: get ready to work every single weekend, and long nights regularly— with zero recognition for your work. As a matter of fact, they implemented a 'learning methodology' that only focuses on what you did wrong. That’s the exact opposite of what strong leaders do, which is to focus on employees’ strengths. You’ll hear something like 'let’s focus on this sprint.' By definition, a sprint is running full speed over a short distance. This company will make you sprint a marathon over and over again and you will be burnt out in no time. Several people have left due to this reason. Oh, and if you don’t sprint, you won’t have a job here for very long.
'TripActions is taking care of its former employees.' False. You probably already read that they laid off ~300 people over Zoom. Did you also hear that the CEO was up there just five days before talking about how the company had enough money and runway for the next 12 months to combat this pandemic (COVID-19)? Or how they let go of employees, who built their department from nothing? Or what about those who remained only due to favouritism? Yep. It’s ironic because so many other companies had to make difficult decisions to have a reduction in force. But TripActions is the only one you hear about because they did it without an ounce of compassion. It’s all about the bottom line and you are replaceable.
'Strong leadership.' Ok, let’s break it down. Most of TripActions management has little to no experience on how to actually lead a team. The CRO’s only card is ruling by fear and intimidation. He does not believe in performance management plans and at any point, you could be fired-- breaking the whole notion where a termination should never come as a surprise to the employee. He also can’t stop clearing his throat which can be distracting to follow his train of thought (can someone please get him a glass of water and a cough drop?) The only thing I gained from him was a reminder of how awesome Daft Punk is, due to his reference to one of their songs. The CMO is an egomaniac who thinks every lead captured is considered a marketing qualified lead and spends millions of dollars on useless events. And a CEO that passes the blame off to his direct reports. He also doesn’t take any action from constructive feedback shared by his employees. Several people came forward and shared harassment, lack of coaching, and a lack of confidence in a manager. Not only did that fall on deaf ears, but the person was promoted! The same issues persist to this day. You can’t make this stuff up.
If you think that’s strong leadership, I don’t want to hear what you think weak leadership is.
