UserTesting reviews about "ceo"

- it’s chaotic and you’ll be overworked - you’ll be expected to do double but when you ask for career progression it’s non existent so good luck getting promoted - the culture is dead, I used to love working at UT before the new CEO and friends took over - constant layoffs

UserTesting private equity owners have created a terrible company in UserTesting. The first CEO was more or less a nice guy but had pretty bad ideas and didn't seem to know much about research, which is important to have if you're a company that sells research, and software to do research. The company is now in a position where it has not made money in over a year and the people who paid billions of dollars for it are worried. Their current strategy is to remove pretty much everyone who works there (starting with the almost entirely terrible c-suite, to their credit) and working their way down until they've removed anyone who knows anything about how to make the company run. Eventually it will be completely filled with robotic business people who can sell themselves to other robotic business people to get hired but don't know anything about research and will continue to be confused as to why they can't sell good deals that last. None of the sales leadership seem to have any idea what it is that is being sold, they can't seem to see examples of what works and what doesn't work and learn, and the turnover in sales leadership has been insane in the last year and a half. Because the sales leadership don't know anything about what they're selling, the people they hire also don't know anything about what they're selling. The sales team just goes after what will get them a commission in the short term without any worry about whether or not it's actually any good for the customers they sell to, i.e., whether what they sell will be renewed, which again, is kind of the whole purpose of an enterprise software company. UserTesting ran with the most insanely bloated yet also absolutely useless marketing team for the better part of a year. When you asked marketing to do something like, say, build some customer facing materials for help with selling some product (like, a one pager), the standard answer you got was that it would take about a month. The CMO was a downright awful person who vocally called to cut different departments, depending on the day. She also did not know anything about research, somehow. Somehow this was an entire department where none of them seemingly did anything, and yet because they are a marketing team they made it seem like they were doing a lot. The culture at UserTesting reflects this. Some people there were good, smart, passionate people, but the majority were absolutely not. The majority of people were there to get a paycheck and rather than try to make that last as long as possible by doing things that would be good for the long term outcomes of the company, they instead brushed problems under the rug and hoped they wouldn't resurface. The common line from UserTesting leadership is that bad reviews of UT are from a minority of disgruntled employees. I am not disgruntled, This is an opinion developed from years of interaction with UT before and after the merger last year and I said these things privately before my end at UT came about. I would not work here, I would not recommend anyone who wants to actually do something important for their paycheck work here.

- No growth opportunities, but they'll demote your title and then tell you its just semantics - Constant instability and threat of layoffs. - Upper management is not interested in any critical feedback. - Gaslighting. Everything is great and if you don't think its great its your fault. - The CEO spoke on all hands meeting like we were a company of idiots. From what I've heard, that hasn't changed. Also we get it you're rich.

SaaS sales roles are often high pressured but UT is next level in terms of pressures and deluded expectations. The attitude is very one sided in that it’s all ask and very little give to help achieve. The new CEO and exec team put in last summer know nothing about the product or market and look as if they are just boiling it down to its most basic parts to prepare for sale. The business seems to operate in a parallel reality of what leadership say is happening and image they want to project and the reality on the ground. There is a constant hope amongst colleagues that it will get better after.. (e.g. the next big round of layoffs etc) - but it actually just gets perpetually worse. There have been at least 8 large rounds of redundancies in 2 years and the remaining team are burnt out, bewilder and looking for a way out. Leadership is relying on the scarcity of other roles at the moment to use that position of power to squeeze the life and soul out of the what’s left of the culture and the individuals in the team.

CEO is good but not all the exec team have the same respect, one exec specifically. She has made some big changes which haven’t gone down well. In sales, we have little time for internal support teams but even less with the way some of them are run. CTO and CFO are both leaving at the same time. CFO was great by all accounts and well respected. His departure seems to be a vote against the res of the exec team. There’s often a lot of hiring of friends from the c-suite which has benefits but it’s happened too much and means that some people are so protected they can do whatever they want, morals aside. Some execs have fired their direct reports and hired only people they know so some of my colleagues can’t see progression. Finance is probably the only exception. It’s a company of change. It will be financially successful, but it would be nice to enjoy the journey with a leadership we can trust and support. It’s close but a few people spoil it and people know they will be cut for speaking out.

Private Equity Thoma Bravo company took over a couple of years ago and squeezed a lot. Good for the PE company, not great for it's employees.

The team has been through a difficult merger and multiple RIFs. There are some employees who are exhausted and demoralized by all the changes and do not yet fully trust the new leadership. So there’s work to do.

i mentioned them in above section

There is no trust among leaders and employees. The new executive team keeps trying to make themselves approachable while talking about their multiple houses. Leadership used to care about empathy and diversity, but you can see that most of the new hires are referrals coming from companies the new execs were previously at. It’s becoming more US-centric, less diverse, and less empathetic every day. Over half of the HR team just left by choice. The new strategy feels like everything is being repackaged as something new and shiny, without any substance. The new values are meaningless and were only adopted because the CEO says they are what he personally lives by. There’s a lack of understanding of our product and many leaders are allowed to slide by with poor behavior, even when it’s reported. This used to be a good place for growth, but now if you don’t say yes to everything, you won’t get ahead.