soona reviews

2.2

17% would recommend to a friend

(45 total reviews)

10% positive business outlook

soona has an employee rating of 2.2 out of 5 stars, based on 45 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have an average working experience there. The soona employee rating is 43% below average for employers within the Information Technology industry (3.9 stars).

Reviews by job title

45 reviews
2.0
Sep 29, 2022
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- Energy is high, there's joking all around, and the slack notifications are always pinging. It can be easy to connect with others across all the studios. - Getting to work with everyday models is fun and makes every shoot with pro-services (models, pets, stylists, etc) more engaging

Cons

- Creatives (photographers, assistants, etc) are expected to do tasks outside their job description on a daily basis. On paper, the studio creative is supposed to shoot up to 6 hours a day within an 8-hour shift. soona often schedules for longer than the 8 hour shift with expectation of doing pre-production outside of those hours and being available on Slack for any questions that may arise. - The average full-time, salaried studio creative makes between $50k and $55k and works an average of 50 hours a week. There are no options for overtime and there is a yearly Rally Day nearing holiday season on a Saturday where every available employee is required to work. - There is no lunch-hour built in to the schedule. While back-to-back shoots no longer happen, a creative is expected to eat between shoots amidst juggling client communication, bay cleanup and setup, and image/gallery offloading. - The work culture is tough: leadership preaches this fun, casual energy, but on the day to day, managers micro-manage. There's a lack of trust and autonomy. It's gossipy and there's a stark lack of professionalism. - There is no real onboarding structure. As a photographer, you shadow for a few shoots then you're flying solo. It can be hard to build confidence in your work when you feel the lack of training under your belt of how to be a successful creative at soona. While you're able to ask your Studio Pro or a fellow creative for help, the absence of formal onboarding and training makes it a tough learning curve.

avatar
soona Response
3y
One year ago, we hired a number of salaried employees due to growing demand from our clients. We now recognize that they needed more training than some of our more seasoned production creatives. We worked to correct this situation in 2022 and now have 6+ days of intensive training for new full-time creative crew members with stepped ramp up for the role. We also continue to update our job descriptions and interview process to ensure clarity of expectations. Professional production is a hard field that requires intense work.That’s why we continue to be open to feedback and are routinely making changes to our production roles and requirements. Throughout the entire company, those with salaried positions often work more than 8 hour days. As a startup, we do our best to be honest about this and have never intended to represent otherwise. Instead, we seek fairness. We offer creatives full-time salaried positions (and part-time hourly) with strong benefits (health, dental, vision, 401K, unlimited PTO, college debt repayment, family leave and more), monthly performance incentives and a career ladder with growth opportunities that lead to roles exceeding $90K. We are proud of the creative staff who have grown to these levels, as well as moved to new roles in other departments. soona also completes competitive marketplace analysis once per year to ensure we are within the market range for all our roles. We will continue to work hard to create a long-term business that provides more opportunities, growth, skill development and a positive place to work (and yes, work hard too) for our entire creative crew.
1.0
Feb 25, 2025

Sinking Ship

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Friendly and positive coworkers are generally pleasant to be around

Cons

No vision or conviction from leadership, constantly chasing the next thing and leaving the last "big thing" unfinished. Leadership team is a round table of "yes men" who, with a few exceptions, contribute little to the company.

2.0
Dec 15, 2023

Stereotypical Start-Up

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- Unlimited PTO - WFH or Hybrid schedule

Cons

- Typical start-up toxic positivity culture - will punish you for only "meeting expectations" - lays off employee multiple times a year - very reactive, when the business tanks they start eliminating positions - lives by "we are flying the plane as we build it" mantra

Viewing 4 - 6 of 45 Reviews

Glassdoor has 51 soona reviews submitted anonymously by soona employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if soona is right for you.