Allen Institute reviews

3.6

51% would recommend to a friend

(183 total reviews)

Rui Costa

63% approve of CEO

48% positive business outlook

Allen Institute has an employee rating of 3.6 out of 5 stars, based on 183 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The Allen Institute employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Management & Consulting industry (3.7 stars).

Reviews by job title

183 reviews
3.0
Dec 4, 2017

Company with a good cause but poor leadership

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

The overall goal of the company is both admirable and respectable. I am glad to be a part of something for the greater good of science. There is a sense of work-life balance.

Cons

Leadership focuses on the wrong things. There is a penny-wise, pound foolish mentality. So much effort is spent on saving so few dollars. A large amount of micromanagement across many levels. It is hard for any decisions to be made without risk of being overruled. Company is very immature when it comes to processes. So many employees perform functions on their own since few processes exist, thus costing the company dollars and time. Teams are resource-constrained.

3.0
Sep 22, 2017

Lofty yet respectable goals suffering from not so great leadership

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Great people. Challenging goals. A desire to complete the mission.

Cons

C level lives in a vacuum and a management is required to focus primarily on managing upward at the detriment of collaboration.

2.0
Oct 20, 2025

Dehumanizing Experience

Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

-Good Benefits ranging from a orca card and free healthcare including health vision and dental. -Amazing Science being done

Cons

-Management is more focused on office politics and trying to cover up their mistakes or inept ability to lead, than actually advancing science -Had managers who tracked their employees every move including bathroom/coffee breaks, felt more like a prison than a workplace -Office politics are over the top and the amount of drama makes working here truly not worth it -A lot of the upper management has been working at the Allen for 10+ years and some of them are there just to collect a check and push their work onto their subordinates -The expectation is that RA's only work there for 2-3 years then they are expected to leave -Bullying is rampant amongst management, they regularly pit their employees against each other to the point where people have to quit or call in sick -Management regularly pushes RA's to work more than their 40 hours and to skip lunches/breaks to do more work -A lot of teams have a sink or swim mentality when it comes to training, either you get it first time or your marked with a scarlet letter -Managers will openly lie and gaslight employees in order to get what they want, after what I experienced I had to go to therapy

Viewing 37 - 39 of 183 Reviews

Glassdoor has 207 Allen Institute reviews submitted anonymously by Allen Institute employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Allen Institute is right for you.