Horrible. Political and cannibalistic environment - Member of Technical Staff II eBay Employee Review

1.0
3 Oct 2013
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

It's large-scale. Otherwise, there are none.

Cons

No work-life balance. Senior execs are all talk and political posturing. They are terrified of poor performance reviews. During reviews, they will go out of their way to ensure that their key staff are viewed as Rock Stars while showing callous indifference to individuals who do not report directly to them. Watching the process, it's shocking to see how their focus on grading to a curve gives them the ability to throw entire teams under the bus. This company is the most risk-averse group of people I have ever met. They spend all their time trying to figure out how to catch up to Amazon and think the only way to do this is to copy all of Amazon's features. Innovation is nothing more than a buzz word to this group. I've watched Engineering VPs talk about creating a world-class team but then think that the way to build morale is to spend $100,000 buying funny hats for everyone to wear at the office.

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5.0
24 June 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

All good, love this company and this job

Cons

No, everything's just nice. I love the company

3.0
20 June 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Relaxing culture. family first. Stock performance is generally good for the recent two years and huge benefit if you're eligible for ESPP. Stable product with large customer base means you get opportunity to work on project with real impact.

Cons

1. Blind push for AI and leadership expect unrealistic efficiency improvement 2. Layoff every year in Feb (2024, 2025, 2026) and sometimes can feel the tension in team 3. Legacy tech stack with isolated and fragile infrastructure. Developer friction is a real pain. You get random infra down every once a while and internal support becomes even worse since they started offshoring to LCOL area in 2025. 4. Hiring freeze in San Jose... just expect more layoff coming up + frequent meetings at night / early morning across regions

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