Free Food, unlimited PTO, team activities, free alcohol
Cons
Time inefficiencies, lacking leadership, ineffective management, hypocrisy, non-merit based evaluations
Gusto Response
10y
We appreciate your honesty and are working towards overcoming many of these startup challenges. Our company-wide surveys provide us with feedback from our team members and the main constant is performance development along with the development of our PE team. We listened to the feedback and 2016 is full of thoughtful plans to help provide our PEs the guidance and tools needed to empower their teams.
The product is genuinely good, too bad the same can’t be said for how they treat the people who sell it.
Cons
Leadership talks a big game about people-first culture but the reality doesn’t match. The Chicago office expansion felt like a poorly thought-out experiment, new hires were brought on without a clear long-term commitment, and layoffs came without warning, leaving people blindsided. Crossing a billion dollars in revenue and still cutting employees sends a clear message about where workers rank on the priority list.
Remote work flexibility is also a glaring weakness. For a company selling HR software to modern businesses, their internal stance on where employees can work is surprisingly rigid and hypocritical. The “flexibility” messaging is mostly optics.
The broader concern is the AI roadmap. The automation push feels less like an innovation strategy and more like a slow wind-down of the workforce. Employees aren’t blind to it, it creates anxiety and erodes trust. The culture of transparency they promote externally is largely a facade internally.