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Smartfrog&Canary

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Smartfrog&Canary Reviews

4.5

89% would recommend to a friend

(86 total reviews)

Charles Fraenkl

94% approve of CEO

88% positive business outlook

Smartfrog&Canary has an employee rating of 4.5 out of 5 stars, based on 86 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have an excellent working experience there. The Smartfrog&Canary employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Information Technology industry (3.9 stars).

Reviews by job title

86 reviews
2.0
18 Mar 2017

Mismanagement and Devaluing of Employees

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

People below management level are smart and great to work with.

Cons

Had to write after seeing some recent generic positive reviews. The company is not doing well, but the scariest part is the level of dishonesty. It's not just omission, it's dishonesty about the financial state, employee roles and other changes being made that are changing entire vibe of product and company (bye bye customer experience/relationships and innovation). It's at all team meetings and also by managers to those they supervise. It's pervasive and creates a toxic vibe because people can tell something is off. This is a small company getting smaller and I'm not sure how they think they can keep doing this or how they will recover from this. The level of ineptitude at the management level is crazy, you can't make it up. And it matters because they are relatively large, secretive and autocratic group. Not high performers at what their supposed roles are, no financial or operational sense, projections that make no sense, delusional about facts related to product and market, talking down to employees who are actually thoughtful, thinking they have all the answers even after everything, and no, they do not value employees (and as desperate as they are to retain engineers they don't seem to "get" that that involves actually valuing them in a real way not just making up what their options will be worth a year from now). It's very clear that they are more concerned with their own egos and personal branding than anything else. It's like a super depressing parody of a company's death spiral. Advice to employees: Ask the tough questions and demand answers. The emperor has no clothes.

2.0
18 Mar 2020

Downsizing, dishonest, and a bit racist

Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Bright office. Fancy parties and events. Some clever teammates.

Cons

So to start, on my very first day, they fired the boss who had hired me, which really set the tone for the rest of my year there. Every other week or so someone would leave the company, and they only had around 40 employees there when I started. The management was also changing month to month, which was partly due to the acquisition by a larger company, but in general all this left employees feeling confused about overall direction and outlook for the company. The biggest irk was management would say from time to time I would still be getting equity, as agreed when I was hired, but never had me sign anything (Surprise: I never got equity). This aspect ended up being pretty openly disrespectful. Advice: Do not work here if you're a woman or minority. Just don't. The atmosphere is cold at times. Certain employees were quite open about not liking the women or minority employees, and not only did the company turn a blind eye to those comments, they ultimately promoted them. The work I was given wasn't very challenging, I would end up bored most of the time, and started looking forward to my next job. To top it all off, after I left, certain managers were pretty clearly trying to prevent me from getting a job at other companies, (it would be mentioned to me at interviews). Wasn't really a problem, but heads up they're a little conspiratorial as well. So, not a *horrible* place to work if you need the paycheck, but in general I would say "not good". Avoid if possible.

3.0
27 May 2015

Lots of Perks; Not Much Culture

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

- There's a lot of free food and leadership is lax with its budget. Basically, if you want anything that costs money, you can probably get it. - A lot of the employees are really amazing people.

Cons

- When I worked there, everything was extremely stressful. Working for non-technical leaders compounded the stress. - The culture disappeared with each passing month. Due to the deadlines and general disorganization, everyone seemed depressed and anxious all the time. Communication was lacking; when people tried to improve something, no one else followed through. Some engineering leads in particular were condescending and unpleasant to work with. Without a solid culture in place beyond a some frat-boy jokes, things could get pretty dismal. It's a shame because a lot of engineers and non-technical employees are really intelligent, talented, and wonderful to work with.

Viewing 1 - 3 of 86 Reviews

Glassdoor has 95 Smartfrog&Canary reviews submitted anonymously by Smartfrog&Canary employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Smartfrog&Canary is right for you.