petty and unethical practices - Anonymous employee Cengage Employee Review

1.0
12 Aug 2014
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Most of the employees are talented, intelligent, and committed to doing their job well.

Cons

M.O.E. = Money Over Everything. Case in point: I found out during my exit interview at Cengage Learning that they would not be paying me for the 3.8 weeks of vacation time that I had accrued. According to HR, CL does not pay employees for unused vacation time unless the employee lives in a state that legally requires employers to do so. WARNING: For those of you outside of MA who are looking for a new job, I would keep this in mind and research it further within your state. I spoke with multiple people within the publishing industry in my state, and they ALL told me that they had never experienced this with other publishers before. I also consulted with an employment attorney who told me that although my state may not require employers to pay for unused vacation time, it's considered general practice to do so since it's unethical not to do so. That says it all. I've made my peace with it at this point, because I consider it the bail money that I posted for my freedom.

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5.0
28 Mar 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Total rewards, time off, great people and culture

Cons

Lots of changes and uncertainty at times

3.0
4 June 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Company has some interesting approaches to the market and in the past they seemed value employees. There are some good employees there and there was, in the past, visionary leadership, but the people with the vision and leadership skills left the company a few years ago.

Cons

The company actively de-values employees. They had a project they called "Project Horizon" where they told all employees they needed to cut costs, so the company was going to have multiple layoffs over 3-5 years - but nobody was allowed to know when, where, or why - - just one day large swaths of people would be gone. That hung over everyone's heads - for years, and is indicative of how Cengage values employees - it doesn't. Everything is about trying to secure new funding and prepare for an IPO, so they stopped investing significantly in the products about 3 years ago and that's about when they stopped acting like they cared about employee wellness as well.

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