Highly political workplace environment and learned to stay in the private clubs - Anonymous employee Workday Employee Review

1.0
11 Dec 2017
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Free snack and bagel !!

Cons

Highly political workplace environment; career success depends on who you know and how well connected you are to company movers and shakers. Many managers and even some higher ups are where they are because they are friends or friends of friends of the people in charge -- not because they are skilled managers. There are tremendous amount of private clubs in Workday and if you are not in one, of those clubs, you are not a value to the company. Most everyone is out for themselves. Working for Workday was like a dream. We are a great company and we are all nice people ... But then ... There is a dark side behind that picture perfect image. The company is full of politics. Your performance mostly doesn't matter (and nobody is really trying to measure it!), it's all about whom you know. Leaders and managers are not held accountable. HR has done their best to facilitate feedback sessions within organizations. The ending results end up being nothing, as the leaders who receive poor feedback either push back or never change, and even worse, are not required to by their own leaders. As leader is connected with higher up. HR or HR leader are all lip services, not supporting at all and if you go and talk to HR or your leader, you end up losing your job with tag “RIF”. It is heart breaking when you work hard and give your 150% and they treat you unfairly and poorly. Management in all area is highly unsupportive of career growth, mid-tier management "leaders" are malicious towards their employees. There is a lot of office bullying, public shaming, favoritism and leaders try to form cliques to secure their power. They do not care about their employees, and the work environment is depend on whom you know and how well kiss your management or agree with "Yes or Sure" word. Best advice I can give is if you come here keep your mouth shut and don't try to make a positive difference. DO NOT stand up for what is right because it will only make you a target. You will loose your job with “RIF” word. Just work on your time and then leave at 5pm.

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Cons

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Workday Response
6d
Thank you for your review. We appreciate you taking the time to share your experience working at Workday. Our goal is to create an open and diverse culture at Workday and we value feedback like this as we strive to become an even better company for our Workmates!
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Cons

Leadership changes freaked a lot of people out. Things felt unstable within the org for the last year (2025). The culture shifted from one that focused on employee growth to adopt all AI at all costs, and do it yesterday! It was extremely stressful to learn so much, so quickly, and create your own use cases and custom workflows - then to ultimately be laid off despite significant contributions.

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Workday Response
2mo
Thank you for your valuable input. At Workday, we pride ourselves on fostering a transparent workplace, maintaining the highest ethical standards, and promoting innovation. It's heartening to hear about your positive journey as a Workmate. We continue to be committed to delivering exceptional experiences for our Workmates.
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