IXL Learning reviews

This is the worst Silicon Valley SaaS company imaginable at which to grow a sustainable, challenging and rewarding career in sales/account management. Awful culture, paltry pay, mind-numbing work and a strange climate of intimidation, fear-mongering and 'good ol' boys' Wolf of Wall Street B.S. straight from the 1980s soils the entire sales department. The majority of employees worth their salt leave within 2 years for greener pastures. The funny thing is that this spectrum of 'better' options available ranges from bootstrapped start-ups to Google/Facebook/Salesforce behemoths. People have actually chosen to be unemployed rather than deal with this soul-suck of an office. This company is literally a stepping stone to other careers, and is sinking in its own morass of mediocrity. The sales department (the entire company, essentially) is run as a dictatorship. Each VP (and each incompetent manager under them) has unilateral authority that goes mostly unchecked. The volume of your voice is more important than the actual work that you do, in that it reaffirms managements' archaic approach to sales. This climate breeds resentment, apathy, rampant job-searching (during work hours!) and fear among employees. Work is largely mindless, repetitive and serves the sole purpose of being able to humble-brag about 'big deals' during meetings with management. It is a tragic comedy.

The way this company operates is quite comical. It has practically been built into a farm system; one that generates good workers and is a good stepping stone to finding a much better job at a better company. I've seen many people leave IXL and land a promising career where they find happiness and engaging work. While I can't speak for every department, I can say that the department I worked in (Sales) is not a very attractive one. I've never heard of a workplace where the average hours of an employee are 10-7 or 9-6; and the ones who work the later hours are praised as if they're working "long" days. Some employees even take it as far to coming in on the weekends, just so they can get praised by management. Sad. Additionally, the workload from the months of June - December are extremely heavy; especially for Membership Specialists and Subscription Renewal Specialists. This can be extremely draining given that the work is not very challenging or engaging. Essentially, you're drowning in 80 phone calls and 80 e-mails a day, just trying to keep your head above the water. Management will try and coax you into working late by providing dinner; and not promoting the importance of an efficient day. As the saying goes - you're overworked and underpaid. I believe this happens because: 1. Employees are not challenged; due to this issue - it leads employees to search for new jobs online WHILE at work. 2. The salary/commission structure is not competitive with similar companies. Most companies pay their employees commissions monthly. However, at IXL they pay it quarterly. On top of that, they withold 10% of it until the end of the year - so you don't quit. 3. No sense of ownership in any part of the job. At most companies the sales team works together. From SDR to Account Executives to Account Management. However, at IXL everyone has such a defined task - that no ones wants/needs to work together. 4. You do not need a degree to do any of this work.