Pros
The pro deals are great. There are pockets of really good and talented people.
Cons
Leadership at REI has some serious blind spots. Every corporate leadership book I have ever read speaks to creating a culture centered on trust, candor, and providing clear goals. REI headquarters lacks these basic building blocks required for a healthy working culture and is instead run on fear, misdirection, and a serious lack of trust. Hoping for a meritocracy, I was instead plunged into a machiavellian culture where posturing, alliances, and manipulation ruled the day. Leaders would regularly withhold information, change goals at the 11th hour, and were rarely empathetic to the ripple and impact on individual contributors. Pushback was not tolerated and most of the stress on the workforce came from sophomoric leaders who lacked confidence in their decisions and constantly wavered under the pressure of an impulsive c-suite. It quickly became clear that collaboration took a backseat to cutthroat individual competition and politics. Meetings were a constant display of bombastic speeches laden with indecision and empty promises to keep the staff from revolting. Watch out. I wouldn't recommend REI to anyone. It’s not a resume builder, and it certainly doesn’t lead anywhere good.
