Poor Management not Outweighed by Fantastic Coworkers
Pros
- The company serves as a great introduction to UX, SaaS, and the tech industry in general. If you're looking to break into the industry but lack the experience, there tend to be a lot of opportunities at UserTesting (UT) to get your foot in the door. - With each passing month, the company is providing more and more fun perks to emulate the startup culture it uses as a crutch (salary 25% below industry average? here's a free 15 minute massage!) - Excellent cohesion within teams. My coworkers were by far the best part of this job and I'm still close friends with many of them.
Cons
I was initially sold on UT by the notion of "you do you," meaning it didn't matter what your style was so long as you did great work. About six months in, there was a dramatic shift away from this philosophy. It became clear that there was a certain way of doing things, and deviation from those ways wouldn't work out well for you. As a result, favoritism (and even nepotism in the case of one family) ran rampant. I don't say this out of jealousy-- hell I took advantage of the favoritism. As a man I only had to be a "bro" to succeed. It quickly became apparent that the quality of my work had no effect on how much I was valued. Another result in this shift was that criticism was no longer genuinely accepted. All companies have things that need to be improved, and UT is definitely no exception. When inefficiencies or product failings were pointed out, one would be ridiculed for negativity and urged to focus elsewhere-- even when multiple suggested solutions and corroborating data were provided. Then again, you don't accumulate the overhead costs for SaaS that UT has without ignoring good ideas. It wasn't watching bad ideas fester into huge money sinks that urged me to leave. Nor was it watching qualified and competent leaders be usurped by those who share last names with the decision maker. It wasn't even the pitiful coercion attempts made against dissenters. The straw that broke my back was being told directly by the COO that "we're all just in this to have our big payday [IPO/acquisition] and cash out." So instead of drinking more Kool-Aid and sacrificing my mental health for some board members' payout, I quit and immediately got a new job paying 50% more where I'm valued for what I actually contribute.