The flexibility and autonomy are great but the management lacks experience and professionalism - Web Developer Archon Systems Employee Review

2.0
8 June 2016
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Archon is a small company and they give a lot of autonomy to their employees. Everyone has a high degree of involvement in contributing at all levels of decision making to the various products.

Cons

You may get fired at this company without warning. The founders don't really know how to manage their employees. As a result they behave immaturely and erratically. There is no HR process at Archon. I was fired after working at Archon for over 5 years and helping to shape the culture. My previous official review had been Very positive. I was let go without warning or justification without any process of official warnings, coaching or probation. That should never happen. Also, It's a small team, so the opportunities to learn from others are lacking. There just isn't a large pool of knowledge on diverse subjects.

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Archon Systems Response
9y
Thank you for taking the time to write this review. I’m sorry about the dismissal as it is never an easy experience. Tough decisions like these are never taken lightly. They are always carefully considered and thoroughly discussed between multiple people for an extended period of time before arriving at any decision. Over 10 years of business, we’ve only had one dismissal outside of an employee’s probation period. As a small growing company with 16 people, I agree that our HR processes were lacking; thank you for your feedback. At the time of the dismissal, we had 2 semi-annual 360-reviews, anonymous written feedback provided by the people we work with. In addition, managers held one-on-one sessions with their team members. In light of this incident, we recognize that the 360-reviews and one-on-one sessions might not have provided a clear enough signal that things were not going well. Moving forward, we will be improving our processes by issuing formal warning letters when applicable, although I don’t expect these to be used often. Thank you for your advice and feedback. It will help to improve our processes and make Archon a better place. Best of luck in your future endeavours. Sincerely, Louis Leung Co-Founder and CEO

Explore other reviews about Archon Systems

3.0
6 May 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

- the rest of the company seems great, there are some genuinely lovely people - the co-founders are empathetic and approachable - the product managers and UX designers are usually very quick to help out the devs in clarifying requirements/designs, etc. - lack of process (if you like that kind of thing) - devs are very heads down (if you like that kind of thing)

Cons

- trust is built on tenure here and you can feel it Specifically for the engineering/product team: - lack of process: skeleton tickets divided randomly with no tech design, devs usually want to dive in without documenting, even at a larger scale - lots of red flags in communication here: passive tone, indirectness, vague feedback, accidentally rude wording, people nervous to speak up - lack of team morale/commraderie - 3-month probation period is taken very seriously here which can feel uninviting - the company tends to hire new grads. There's not a lot of industry expertise coming in, and sometimes it feels like the team is reinventing the wheel because of that - the culture feels like whiplash compared to the rest of the company The vibe of the dev team is like classic quiet nerdy compsci dudes - that's not necessarily a con, but just be aware.

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Archon Systems Response
1y
Thank you for your feedback here, you have some thoughtful and insightful comments that I think offers a valuable perspective to visitors here. There’s a few elements I’d like to respond to though for the record. I would agree that the vibe of the engineering/dev team is pretty quiet; we definitely have a majority of introverts on the team currently, although we do value outgoing people who can help bring the team together more as well. I would disagree with you on the lack of morale/camaraderie however. Based on my own observations and internal surveys, I’d say there is a lot of trust, respect, and friendship within the dev team, even if it typically presents in fairly quiet and understated ways. Communication is something that we are always working on; we are open and authentic, but sometimes not as polished as we could be. We do unapologetically take the probation period seriously (while also being as welcoming as possible), and in tough conversations striking the right balance between clarity and empathy is an ongoing effort, for which your feedback is noted with appreciation. As a bootstrapped company, we are independent thinkers, and while we sometimes do reinvent the wheel, I’m OK with that if it means that we don’t import external dysfunction and have the courage to come up with innovations that work best for us, like setting up a hybrid work environment long before that idea was mainstream. We see required process and scheduled meetings as necessary evils to be minimized so that we can maximize the amount of freedom and focused time for great teams to do great work, but that balance is constantly being tweaked. Thank you once again and I hope you will continue to view me as approachable going forward – please feel free to reach out (you should have my email and/or LinkedIn) if there’s anything I can do for you. -Stephen Co-Founder
5.0
28 July 2025
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Amazing culture, feels like a family. Led by great leaders who care about each and every employee, respect everyone's insights and feedback, and thrive to work together for the best possible results.

Cons

Less growth opportunities within a smaller company.

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