Instrument reviews

Instrument has an incredibly clique-y culture where if you're in the in-group, you'll grow your career and get to work on cool stuff, and if you're not in the in-group, you're doing all the work that the in-group doesn't want to do and nobody cares about your "career growth". A lot of the people in the clique are related/in a relationship/long time close friends. The in-group also is all white- BIPOC employees are in the out group. Yes, leadership talks a lot about diversity, equity, and inclusion, and often quotes the most watered-down quotes of civil rights leaders. However, they certainly have neither listened nor learned as they said they would in 2020, as I've watched so many talented co-workers get denied promotions, repeatedly put on work that didn't support their career goals, and had their (legitimate!) concerns disregarded, while their white counterparts got promotion after promotion, put on all the cool projects, and had their feelings heard. My personal experience has led to some heavy imposter syndrome and a self-esteem decrease, as I kept trying to work harder, trying to communicate my career goals, and trying to chase the next promotion, and was shut down again and again. If you choose to work here, just know that when it comes to layoffs they're not going to keep you over someone's cousin and when it comes to promotions they're not going to promote you instead of so-and-so's in-law.

• They know all the right things to say to get you in the door but once you're there, you'll quickly realize it was all just lip service and all the things they promised are never coming. • As others have pointed out, it is incredibly cliquey. It felt like high school with the jocks and the mean girls running the campus. • Individuals with tenure seem to fail up. Complaints would regularly be filed against management but rather than dealing with those complaints, those individuals would either be promoted into new roles or the individuals filing the complaint would simply be shuffled to other teams. • HR was virtually non-existent. If you filed a complaint with HR, they would either tell you why they felt it was a non-issue or worse, they would go tell the individual that you filed a complaint against them. It left many feeling hopeless and it wasn't uncommon to see someone tucked away in tears. • Senior new hires are typically convinced to accept lower pay and a lower title with the promise of a promotion once they learn the Instrument way. With each review cycle comes a new excuse on why they are unable or unwilling to make those promotions. As a result, senior hires are a bit of a revolving door. At various points we were clapping out multiple people in a single a day. • Designers are regularly pulled mid project to chase new business opportunities. It was incredibly frustrating to not be able to see a project through. • Timelines and team size were typically insufficient which often resulted in many having to work from home on nights and weekends to pick up the slack. It completely contradicted the work/life balance they have promoted for so long. • Pay does not meet market rate. Honestly, the list of cons goes on and on but the bottom line is that I, like many, walked into my time with Instrument with so much excitement and passion and in the end, it was the darkest period of my career.