Pros
Goodreads is 10 years old, and was acquired by Amazon a few years ago. We get a lot of benefit from being part of Amazon, but also maintain a lot of the awesome, independent Goodreads culture. The best part about Goodreads is the employees. Everyone is brilliant, passionate, and just plain nice. There is a lot of work to do, but the workload is manageable. When people stay late at the office, it's typically to play games! There are a bunch of perks, but it's not obscene like you'll see at other tech companies—no giant chrome pandas here (though we do have an inflatable whale). We get free breakfast and lunch a couple times a week, 10% time to work on passion projects, tons of free books, snacks, a keg, team outings, a twice-yearly company-wide fun day, career development budget, team outings, volunteer opportunities, multiple book clubs—including a Chinese book club and a feminist book club—and did I mention books!? But what really keeps me motivated and proud to work at Goodreads is our underlying mission: helping people read more and share their ideas—a worthy goal!
Cons
Our goals are aggressive, which is great—but sometimes it feels like we're trying to do too much.
