Uniphore started laying off shortly after I arrived. Which should have been the writing on the wall. Personally, I believe layoffs reflect incredibly poorly on leadership. It also seemed like there were some good layoffs, meaning people they probably should have terminated for lack of performance, and then there were those that they should not have layed off, which is evident in that they are rehiring for a role or two that was layed off (Hiring more Jr because it's illegal to rehire for an eliminated position of the same calibur, still paying the same though). So, it's clear they aren't entirely sure of their real business needs, which means they aren't listening to their workforce or customers, who in my opinion were very vocal about their needs, and not discouraged from sharing such things. Not sure if it was over hiring or if they were having trouble with market fit for their offering but obviously they felt they needed to downsize to keep the lights on. People complained a lot about the culture but I think the bulk of that was some people felt like they were pulling more weight than others. It's an organization that straddles two work cultures, Indian and American. It reminded me a bit of the documentary "American Factory", however, not that dramatic. Just a different culture that places different emphasis on being available around the clock for work. American's value work life balance whereas it seems on the other end it's a race to the bottom on who's working at all times. I do appreciate the results based competition the collision of cultures brings, but that makes it a bit cut throat. Alas, startups tend to be cut throat. All in all I enjoyed my time here and could deal with the all the above and didn't feel overly impacted by it. I also made sure I was not apart of the problem, although it was clear when someone stabbed you in the back or had a target on your back which is an unfortunate zero sum game.
