A look into your future with Sourcebooks - Anonymous employee Sourcebooks Employee Review

2.0
Aug 18, 2019
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Great location near train and restaurants.

Cons

So here's how it'll go down. You just saw a job opening at sourcebooks. Wow, whoopie! A publishing company! You're as excited as a chubby kid eating a doughnut. You love books. In fact, you love reading so much, you daydream of one day becoming a writer. Yo, who are we kidding, you probably have the first draft of some romance-sci fi-coming of age novel on your laptop right now. Yeah, sure you have some fancy college degree and the only job opening is below your skill-set. But dude, this is your dream job! If the movie Devil Wears Prada has taught us anything, it's that hard work, and a cute outfit will move us up in the world. So what if the pay is lousy, you can defer those student loans a few more years. 1 month: This place is the greatest! You're surrounded by so many like-minded, intelligent, talented people. In an effort to look efficient, you get all your work done earlier than expected. Wow, won't your boss be impressed? Oops, you just set your bar too high. Enjoy double the workload next week.  3 months: Beep beep, what's that? It's the bus that ran you over. But why?! You did exactly what your boss asked you to. And there's the keyword, "asked." You just learned a valuable lesson. You didn't get that chitchat in writing. You see, you're still too new. You're what they call a scapegoat. But it's all cool. If you apologize enough, they won't see you as a threat. Now go cry in the bathroom, so you don't make a scene. 6 months: What's that smell coming from the kitchen? Why is it so flipping cold in here. Was the printer always that loud? Uh oh, you're starting to crack. Everything has the potential to set you off. As you struggle to have a decent work-life balance, you find yourself taking on more and more work due to the large employee overturn. But hang in there kid. A little piece of paper that says, "Thanks for all your hard work" is coming your way. Oh, did you think it was going to be a raise? It's way too soon for that you silly goose. Year 1: Congratulations, you now get to write your own yearly review, cause god forbid your mangers evaluation will be enough. So relax and take the next day or so to waste away your time to think of impressive, yet realistic, goals you will accomplish next year. But it's not all bad news; you got your annually 3% raise. But don't celebrate too hard, you still got those student loans you got to pay off. Year 2: Well, to be honest, you probably won't make it this far. But if you do, you're tougher or more pathetic than I thought. You've seen a lot of deplorable stuff at this point. You know what managers and directors you can trust and the ones to be fake too. You've mastered stroking the CEO's massive ego. You're a seasoned soldier. You now smirk at the new hires. You'd like to warn them. Maybe even guide them. But no fs are given, your soul is far too dead. You return to your work, checking your voicemail, in hopes that other company, you just interviewed for, makes you an offer today.

Explore other reviews about Sourcebooks

5.0
Jun 20, 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Incredible managers, great team, genuine openness to growth and learning, meaningful work

Cons

None to speak of at this moment

1.0
Apr 20, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

In hindsight, I'm not sure if there were any apart from some friendly coworkers.

Cons

I infuriatingly see promotions handed out left and right via LinkedIn, but just know that actually being someone to get to that level means literally grovelling and being lucky enough to be in the good graces of the egotistical CEO. Upper management brown-noses her as their main job, and they will prevent you from any upward mobility if you're not one of her favorites (which seems to be picked based on how much you kiss up to her, and if you keep your own opinions to yourself, and other factors entirely unrelated to your actual performance). Absolutely criminally high monthly healthcare premiums, paired with insanely high deductibles, bare-minimum PTO, and mat leave. HR is a joke and not one HR employee seems to last very long. Salaries are abysmal, even by publishing standards. Most books acquired are bottom-of-the-barrel since they don't pay most of their authors much, and they have to be edited within an inch of their lives to be readable and marketable. I left the industry after this company and have never been happier.

2
See reviews by: Helpful|Rating|Date|All