Pros
Invoca puts out a top-tier software product and continues to innovate in its market segment. The culture is great and there is tremendous opportunity to learn from the best.
After a rocky period in 2016 where the CEO and executive team were not executing well, we got a new CEO, a new VP of Sales, and promoted a new VP of Marketing from within. They are all excellent! They have ushered in a new era of communication, transparency, and excitement. It’s great to see how strong the lines of communication have become across departments over the course of 2017. The product vision is clear, the market opportunity is huge, and the entire company has really hit its stride.
Awesome things management has done over the course of 2017 to make Invoca a great place to work:
* New quarterly feedback mechanism from employees to management. Scores are shared at the company-wide meetings. Feedback is not just addressed, but acted on.
* They brought in a consulting firm that specializes in career track development within companies. That firm did analysis and gave plans of action to managers, and also met with employees to get feedback and give advice. Nicely done.
* They brought in speakers to address important topics like gender equality in the workplace.
* They brought in speakers to address out-of-work topics like “how to buy a home”.
* They implemented new processes to align company departments to the same goals with lots of cross-team brainstorming. Nicely done.
Management Accessibility:
* I feel I can walk into my manager’s office at any time and discuss any kind of concern or issue with him.
* I feel I can message our CEO anytime and discuss ideas, brainstorm, and so forth.
Cross Team Communication:
* In the past month, I’ve had both 1:1 and large group discussions and sessions with every other department at Invoca. And I’m in engineering, which at a lot of tech companies, can be pretty insular. Clearly, not an issue here. Most of these meetings were focused on the customer: how to build the best features for them, how to educate them on how to get the most out of the product, and how innovative new features are making their lives better.
Excellent Culture:
* In the last month, I’ve done all of the following with fellow Invocans:
- Ping Pong
- Beer Pong
- Jam Sessions
- Lawn Bowling
* And prior to that
- Ultimate Frisbee on the beach
- Landshark parties
- Moscow Mule parties
- Rooftop BBQ’s
- Invoca Holiday Cider
We work hard but we know how to have a good time too!
Cons
The market we serve has a certain inherent complexity to it - enterprise customers need integration and optimization across multiple marketing channels and their marketing technology stack. Invoca excels at providing this, but it also means that as an employee, you need to feel comfortable navigating a certain amount of complexity so that you can communicate well with the customer and/or build a product that meets their needs.
