Helix reviews

3.8

68% would recommend to a friend

(118 total reviews)
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James Lu

86% approve of CEO

65% positive business outlook

Helix has an employee rating of 3.8 out of 5 stars, based on 118 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The Helix employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Pharmaceutical & Biotechnology industry (3.5 stars).

Reviews by job title

118 reviews
1.0
Mar 16, 2018

Timber!

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Helix had all the recipes for great success when they first started the company. On the surface level, great leadership, strong backing by Illumina, inspirational team members, and an incredible dream to change the landscape in consumer genomics. There are still great team members here(Director level and below) but the inspiration has been sucked out of every employee by the politics and lack of real leadership at the top of this company. This is a dog eat dog company where leaders are hired because of their relationship with the C-suite. Cough, diversity? What diversity means at the leadership level is graduating from Stanford between the years of 2002 and 2010. That was the criteria to get hired as a VP of co-founder. This is an extremely smart group, but smarts don't equate to leadership and tenured management experience. Most haven't actually managed people before Helix, ever, and it's showing. The results of lack of management or leadership training is busting from the seems and the teams below them are suffering. Quarter after quarter employee engagement is inching lower and lower...now falling on a knife. It's a sad state of affairs when people sacrifice their lives to companies that promise trust, transparency, and collaborative work environments only to be thrust into a real-world Game of Thrones with King Joffrey and his cohort rule at the top. The best people are getting axed like Ed Stark on the chopping block. Not literally, but figuratively pushed out by the political games of a tyrannical culture where "integrity, integrity, intregrity" really means do it my way or get the hell out. It's time for year-end reviews, bonuses, and promotion cycles. This is the time where people should be coming together and celebrating big wins. There will be some celebration for those that are doing well in the regime and rightfully so...they got lucky knowing the right people at the right time during their collegiate years or sit pretty at the top and have no real accountability for their people. For the other 95% of people, do the rounds with the HR team as they come out of their nestled corner and attempt to talk to you after a year of dormancy. The employee engagement survey is going to be taken seriously this time by the gang. We’re going to turn this place into an amazing place to work! The Leadership Team is making the moves to turn into a group that you were hoping you would be able to trust. Don't pay attention to the exodus of people that are starting to resign and leave for greener pastures. Or the massive dilution event that's turned your .00004% into .00000000004%. At least the dilution we face this time has been transparent and not brushed under the rug by the good citizens in HR. The dream that our stock is going to make us millionaires is still here! Oh wait, that’s only for protected individuals at the C-suite that are getting refreshers to keep them whole. But don’t worry, you’ve been given a refresher too during your review to keep you somewhat whole, haven’t you? Or you can leave with the rest of us and take your life back.

Cons

Stanford Management System and Hiring Practices Engineering Leadership Dormant CEO Lack of authenticity and trust with leadership

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Helix Response
8y
Thanks for your feedback as we value everyone’s input at Helix - even if it stings. We care about each and every employee. We spend a lot of time on developing the best solutions and people. When you join Helix, you are joining a high-performing team that is at the bleeding edge of science and engineering. We are proud to give employees a lot of responsibility to help them develop their careers. There are a number of new managers at Helix, and we do our best to coach and support them in developing those skills. Growth opportunities are important for our employees. In our business, innovation is important, and we need the best ideas and talent to make things happen. Integrity at Helix means doing the right thing, even when it is hard. Being in this space demands that our leaders must make hard decisions frequently, even when these decisions are not popular. They are evaluated by how well they decide, not only by their boss and their peers but by their team. We spend a lot of time listening to each other’s ideas and feedback, whether that is in the all-hands forums with the leaders, 360 development feedback, 1:1s with our managers, our peer-based mentoring program, or in our quarterly engagement survey. Helix employees are direct, and straight up. We are transparent in our weekly all-hands with everything from what is going on within teams, to how our partnerships are doing, to our products, and even what is discussed with the board. We are proud of our relatively high employee engagement and we listen and act on peoples’ feedback. I hear that you think a lot of people are unhappy, but overall, our recent engagement survey suggests that people are engaged, passionate about our mission, and feel connected with their colleagues. That being said, we are always working on improving how we work, communicate and make decisions. We are genuinely sorry that you are frustrated and leaving the Helix team. If you want to talk, we’d love you to reconsider. We value every person here and we know that we are positioned to accomplish our mission of empowering every person to improve their life through DNA. Jade Curtis VP People Operations
2.0
May 10, 2018

Employees are not a priority

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- Set up for success. - Great support from investors. - Founders are passionate and want to see the company succeed. - Lots of smart people who care about the company.

Cons

- Executives do not listen to employees. Constantly tell them to "hold out" for things to be improved. - Perks awarded to employees that have social ties with the CEO. - Lack of transparency and employee happiness translates into waves of departures.

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Helix Response
8y
As Helix grows, we evolve our way of thinking with it, taking input from the numerous talented and diverse backgrounds we have here. Sometimes those voices are at the executive level, and sometimes they’re at the individual contributor level. Regardless, we evaluate all input in the context of how it impacts our people and our business. Employees are *the* priority, and to hear you think otherwise is a sign that we’ve fallen short. Without the stellar team of scientists, marketers, technologists and industry leaders we’ve assembled, the company wouldn’t be positioned to create a new consumer category from scratch. As with any company—large or small, implementing improvements can take time, and in some instances the rate at which these take place doesn’t suit every employees. We’re sorry if that is the case, but want to be clear that we make every effort to think about the impact each decision will have on each and everyone one of our colleagues. There are a lot of people who care about this company, and we make every effort to do right by the people who are committed to helping us achieve our vision. We’ve built a transparent culture where we share our product roadmap, pending partnerships, and business outcomes at our weekly company meeting. We want employees to have the information they need to be successful in their role, and that goes both ways—we want to hear more from you. Please chat with your manager, LT member, or People Ops. We want to work with you to make Helix great for every person on our team. - Selasi
5.0
Oct 11, 2017

Best Company Ever.

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Helix epitomizes why I love technology and the tech industry. Useful products, brilliant and diverse co-workers, collaborative decisions & culture and most importantly, a mission I can feel good about when I go to sleep every night. Optimistic and honest CEO. Leaders are incredibly approachable and available. Good work-hard-play-hard balance. This is as good as it gets.

Cons

Still has some growing pains from startup. Some departments are still new and have constant change. Company is growing fairly quickly, which puts a fair amount of strain on managers & can cause a bit of chaos.

Viewing 4 - 6 of 118 Reviews

Glassdoor has 153 Helix reviews submitted anonymously by Helix employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Helix is right for you.