Due to the company's position in the market, it is truly at the stage where every last employee (including the C-suite) could leave tomorrow and it wouldn't matter in the long term. New faces could be plugged in, and the company would continue being profitable with entirely new faces. While this is obviously "good for the business," not much has been done to make ICs feel valued over feeling like "cogs in a system." This previously was not the case when the company was in a "startup mentality."
The return-to-office policy has not been handled well. The company moved to 4-5 days in-office, which many employees have expressed was implemented without data or adequate justification, and has contributed to meaningful talent attrition. Internally, some roles appear to be held to stricter in-office requirements than others, which is discouraging.
Workforce attrition has been an issue with empty roles not always being backfilled. This has created workload pain as work gets redistributed to already stretched teams. The response to this from leaders is a general "lean-into-AI-tools" mantra. But expectations around how Al can realistically compress timelines are more aspirational than realistic.
A noticeable number of employees have now left for competitors. Leaving with dignity in these cases is not possible. Leadership takes it personally when this happens.
Recognition at the higher levels is heavily skewed toward Sales/AE roles. Engineers, PS, and other functions can feel invisible. The same small group of people tend to get nominated and recognized repeatedly.
Manager quality is uneven. Some (not all) managers are technically underprepared for their roles, promotions don't always track with performance ratings, and there's a pattern of favoritism in both recognition and advancement.
Leadership credibility has been eroding. Employees have expressed that internal feedback has historically been collected and ignored. Also, internal feedback hasn't always been as anonymous as it could be--which has led to a lack of psychological safety. This has created a culture where diplomatic/agreeable feedback is rewarded and honest/sincere feedback is punished.
Employees in the Pune office have expressed concerns about local leaders not advocating effectively with U.S. leadership for their teams. With the India team growing quickly, this dynamic is something to keep on eye on.
Compensation has produced concerns. New hires often come in at higher pay levels than tenured employees in equivalent roles. The irony is that tenured employees who have stuck around and have been through a lot often watch those new hires leave within a year or two.
