Decent company, but behind the market and falling to the innovator's dilemma
Pros
Rosetta Stone's people are kind, talented, genuine, and most of them joined the company to make the world a better place. The benefits are decent, and as of 2015, they added unlimited vacation time. Its many locations in the United States gives a cool opportunity for leaders and key contributors to travel all over.
Cons
Rosetta Stone's sales and marketing grew it into a world leader leading up to the 2008 market crash. Since then, it has put out isolated silos of innovation, and the technical staff were top notch. However, the main drivers of the organization became sales and marketing, along with public shareholders. Amidst this, the culture to promote, surface, and then fully execute on product and engineering innovation languished. As the economy shifted away, the company failed to capitalize on its world class brand and technology, and as consumers were slipping, sales and marketing only tightened their grip on product development. Today, the organization is mostly sales and marketing driven, with the whole product org reporting not to the CEO but to the President of E&E, and with the company subjugated under a "turnaround" regime led by John Hass and Al Angrisani. It may indeed succeed at the turnaround, but I fear that innovation in educational technology and pedagogy is now much more likely to happen outside of the company than within it.
