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You don't say! I used to work as an engineer at a truly awful little company, the worst I've been at, and when I left I gave them a scathing review. Not long af

You don't say! I used to work as an engineer at a truly awful little company, the worst I've been at, and when I left I gave them a scathing review. Not long after, several new reviews popped up. Here are some choice excerpts, get a load of this: > Pros: > For anyone reading these reviews, take it from someone who has been at this company for over 10 years, some people just like to use these review sites as a sounding board for their own distorted views of a company where they obviously were let go for good and obvious reasons. > [skipping forward a bit] >The truth is that every company will inevitably come across a "sour grape" that was not meant to be part of that companies future. Its just a shame that instead of trying to improve themselves they waste time trying to justify their irrational beliefs and convince themselves that writing negative reviews will somehow fortify their distorted view of what actually happened during their time there. >Cons >Former employees that sit in dark rooms and write negative reviews in between shifts at the local convenience store. --------------- Then they separately put up some absurd propaganda reviews. This one was titled "Sunshine, Unicorns and GumDrops," if you can believe that: > I have been with Snowbound for quite a long time(about 10 years) and I have been meaning to write a review. I am inclined to agree with the "like a family and home away from home” reviews. At least on my side of the office it’s the land of Sunshine, Unicorns and Gumdrops. We like to work hard but also have a good time doing it. Then they had another one titled "Like a family", here's an excerpt~ > You aren't just a number or a body behind a computer screen. If you're going through a personal issue, … Yeah, like when I was fired and the CTO coldly told me "We can do better than you." This is the same guy who I watched stroke a waitress's hand as he passed her a tip during a company lunch outing and tell her "You have a smoking ass." -------- There's another review titled "home away from home," and another called "long time here and worth it," but you get the point.

sevensor 8y ago
Run from any prospective employer who tells you, "we're like a family." They mean it an all the worst ways. Feuding, dysfunction, racist uncles, getting kicked out of the house.
- NorthOf33rd 8y ago
  I just sat through a company wide "Sensitivity Training" at my company (which I'm very much looking forward to leaving, and leaving a review for,) where "We're a family" was repeated ad nausium. I was a little shocked that this was coming from HR and Staff. It was almost a cultish call and response of bullshit. The reality is, we're not family. I don't have to be sensitive to my family. If I don't like them, I can say and do as I please. If they don't like me, the same. I don't have to care about their feelings, I don't have to accept their life choices. I don't have to see them every day. I don't have to accomplish tasks with them. I can quarrel with them, and eventually they may choose to forgive me because of kinship, or not. Point being, there are precisely zero commonalities between family and work peers. And there shouldn't be. The contrarian jerk in me really wanted to yell an epithet during training and say something along the lines of "What, if we're a family, I'm the racist uncle that your dad keeps inviting to dinner despite his offensive tirades and uncomfortable leering at your sister. Deal with it."
  - freedomben 8y ago
    > The contrarian jerk in me really wanted to yell an epithet during training and say something along the lines of "What, if we're a family, I'm the racist uncle that your dad keeps inviting to dinner despite his offensive tirades and uncomfortable leering at your sister. LOL. But in general I very much agree. Equating a workplace with a family is gross, and a bit cult-ish. I do think the workplace (and the world) would be a better place if we all tried to love each other like we do our own family, but there's a whole lot of other things family brings that would make the workplace a nightmare, the least of which is widespread manipulation, power struggles, mooching, and non-stop drama.
    - NorthOf33rd 8y ago
      That's assuming that loving each other like our own family would be loving in a loving way, and not in an absolute deep down rage love-to-hate way. But yes, I agree with your sentiment. We're all just people trying to make it and a little love goes a long way.
    - 8y ago
drugme 8y ago
Former employees that sit in dark rooms and write negative reviews in between shifts at the local convenience store. Wow - that sounds amazingly petty and vindictive. These people must have been a pure mindfuck to work for. Thank you for posting that, so that people looking for information about this company (Snowbound Software) can be adequately informed about what to expect in engaging in dealings of any kind with this shop.
- aerovistae 8y ago
  Right? They proved my point far more effectively than I could ever have done.
NotHereNotThere 8y ago
Since you opted to reveal the company's name (Snowbound software), I went ahead and read the reviews on GlassDoor. Your review is very emotionally charged and with very few facts or examples, which makes it difficult to take seriously. Since you were fired I can understand why you would write like this, but it is a bit ironic considering the article is about manipulating reviews. Yours is scathing indeed, but not in an insightful way and just seems like an attempt to bash the company (1 star, all reds, only pros are low pressure environment and parking?). I can understand why the company would want to defend itself against this with actual facts (they state increased revenue, staff seniority, customer names). Anyways take whatever you want from this comment, I'm just a neutral observer with limited information, but I don't think Snowbound's positive reviews show manipulation
- justin66 8y ago
  The negative review was informative enough. Political, negative work environment and old, dead tech. Blah blah. It's the context that is particularly damning. Whenever you see a heartfelt negative review surrounded by obviously fake or reactionary (do you really not see that?) positive reviews, that is a red flag. It is not uncommon.
  - hn_throwaway_99 8y ago
    I totally disagree. When I read reviews (on Glassdoor or anywhere, really) I try to discount any emotionally charged content and focus on the factual elements of the reviews. I mean, "Political, negative work environment"? Every single group of humans since the beginning of time has a level of political interaction, so when I see comments about things being political I pretty much discount them unless there are some level of specifics. I've also seen folks make the "political" charge when what was really at issue is the person didn't communicate or work well with others, and it takes a level of emotional maturity to realize why this is important.
    - aerovistae 8y ago
      > factual elements of the reviews What facts can you really share though? This isn't a court situation, where evidence is scrutinized and held up to rigorous standards. So what are you really expecting? Transcripts of conversations? Financial documents? I don't really understand what kind of "facts" you would be looking for. Reviews are all about "how was your subjective experience there." If the answer is "awful, the company treated me poorly," then that's a legitimate review. Why would you discount it?
ducktypegoose 8y ago
How could someone write these words you quoted and not see the irony? I could understand wanting to respond to a scathing review you felt was unfair but it's one of those things as a normal person I would probably stop half way through and move on. Did this guy really keep going and post under different accounts? You're lucky you got out of there when you did.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
markbnj 8y ago
This is nothing more than my own opinion, formed over 25 years in software: look forward, not back. If you find yourself venting on a site like glassdoor stop and think it through. Yes ostensibly the point is to help others avoid a similar experience, but the reality is that relationships between employer and employee are so fraught with subjective qualities that it's very hard to say how generally applicable your personal experience is. If you can confine yourself to statements of fact - they have this policy or don't have that one - then that may be actually helpful. Having a bad experience with an employer, especially one that results in involuntary separation, can leave a lot of emotional baggage for you to deal with it. I'd say the last place you should deal with it is in public on a review site.
ben509 8y ago
That "Cons" is possibly the worst thing someone could post. That they hold a grudge when someone left is a _huge_ red flag.
skookumchuck 8y ago
Like everyone, I know lots of divorced couples. If you listen to the man, his ex is 100% to blame. If you listen to the woman, her ex is 100% to blame. So when I hear a rant from someone about their ex, their boss, etc., I nod sympathetically and think to myself "I wonder what that person would say about you."
- aerovistae 8y ago
  Agreed, I do the same. That said, for what it's worth, I've worked at five companies now and 3 out of 5 were great. The fourth is the one discussed in this thread, and the fifth had 3 hours of meetings per day for every engineer.
FilterSweep 8y ago
A previous employer would do the same thing. They would astroturf reviews whenever they received a bad one.
ubertaco 8y ago
Yeah, I left a negative review for a startup where I worked, and it was the first review (I actually had to create an entry for the startup in order to leave the review). I tried to be balanced about the things that attracted me there in the first place, and the kind of person who might be able to last a while there, but noted the downsides that drove me out. Within a month, four more reviews, all 5-star reviews with "cons" sections like "none" or "I don't like this particular office snack" popped up for this company that had existed without reviews for years, all of which were very obviously in the unusual and quite-recognizable writing style of the head sales guy (who was constantly recruiting because of his habit of scapegoating his 3-or-4-person sales team when the company did poorly, and thus firing and replacing all of them), down to his particular mannerisms that I hadn't heard from anyone else (with the same wording appearing in multiple reviews). I flagged these reviews as obviously by the same author, one who was an "executive" employee of the company, and that I was willing to provide samples to prove it. I've since re-flagged those reviews a few times before realizing that Glassdoor has no interest in responding. Since then, it appears that the same guy has taken to requiring his new hires (of which he has many, due to his high churn rate from firing and replacing every single BDR/SDR regularly) to write at least one glowing review on Glassdoor, which has grossly inflated the company's score. The lesson I learned from this experience was to skim positive reviews looking for dangerous euphemisms ("more than just a job" means "no work-life balance", "like a family" means "unprofessional (and often backstabbing) working relationships", "fast-paced" / "driven" / "high-performer" means again that no work-life balance exists) count the number of negative reviews as a health indicator, and read negative reviews looking for repeated themes to identify real problems. For example, a smallish (50 or so people) company I considered in my last job hunt had several negative reviews that contained phrases like "CEO conducts a whisper campaign against employees he doesn't like", and "getting on the CEO's bad side is easy and damning", while positive reviews said things like "not everyone can adapt to our flat structure" or "it's not for everyone", or "if you can learn to fit in, it's great". That sent the clear signal: there is no real reporting chain, just the CEO's capriciousness, and the CEO plays favorites (or "unfavorites") arbitrarily and heavy-handedly. The verdict: avoid this company. As with any source of user-submitted reviews online, you have to learn a certain degree of cynicism in order to arrive at an informed decision.

sevensor 8y ago

Run from any prospective employer who tells you, "we're like a family." They mean it an all the worst ways. Feuding, dysfunction, racist uncles, getting kicked out of the house.

NorthOf33rd 8y ago
I just sat through a company wide "Sensitivity Training" at my company (which I'm very much looking forward to leaving, and leaving a review for,) where "We're a family" was repeated ad nausium. I was a little shocked that this was coming from HR and Staff. It was almost a cultish call and response of bullshit. The reality is, we're not family. I don't have to be sensitive to my family. If I don't like them, I can say and do as I please. If they don't like me, the same. I don't have to care about their feelings, I don't have to accept their life choices. I don't have to see them every day. I don't have to accomplish tasks with them. I can quarrel with them, and eventually they may choose to forgive me because of kinship, or not. Point being, there are precisely zero commonalities between family and work peers. And there shouldn't be. The contrarian jerk in me really wanted to yell an epithet during training and say something along the lines of "What, if we're a family, I'm the racist uncle that your dad keeps inviting to dinner despite his offensive tirades and uncomfortable leering at your sister. Deal with it."
- freedomben 8y ago
  > The contrarian jerk in me really wanted to yell an epithet during training and say something along the lines of "What, if we're a family, I'm the racist uncle that your dad keeps inviting to dinner despite his offensive tirades and uncomfortable leering at your sister. LOL. But in general I very much agree. Equating a workplace with a family is gross, and a bit cult-ish. I do think the workplace (and the world) would be a better place if we all tried to love each other like we do our own family, but there's a whole lot of other things family brings that would make the workplace a nightmare, the least of which is widespread manipulation, power struggles, mooching, and non-stop drama.
  - NorthOf33rd 8y ago
    That's assuming that loving each other like our own family would be loving in a loving way, and not in an absolute deep down rage love-to-hate way. But yes, I agree with your sentiment. We're all just people trying to make it and a little love goes a long way.
  - 8y ago

drugme 8y ago

Former employees that sit in dark rooms and write negative reviews in between shifts at the local convenience store. Wow - that sounds amazingly petty and vindictive. These people must have been a pure mindfuck to work for. Thank you for posting that, so that people looking for information about this company (Snowbound Software) can be adequately informed about what to expect in engaging in dealings of any kind with this shop.

aerovistae 8y ago
Right? They proved my point far more effectively than I could ever have done.

NotHereNotThere 8y ago

Since you opted to reveal the company's name (Snowbound software), I went ahead and read the reviews on GlassDoor. Your review is very emotionally charged and with very few facts or examples, which makes it difficult to take seriously. Since you were fired I can understand why you would write like this, but it is a bit ironic considering the article is about manipulating reviews. Yours is scathing indeed, but not in an insightful way and just seems like an attempt to bash the company (1 star, all reds, only pros are low pressure environment and parking?). I can understand why the company would want to defend itself against this with actual facts (they state increased revenue, staff seniority, customer names). Anyways take whatever you want from this comment, I'm just a neutral observer with limited information, but I don't think Snowbound's positive reviews show manipulation

justin66 8y ago
The negative review was informative enough. Political, negative work environment and old, dead tech. Blah blah. It's the context that is particularly damning. Whenever you see a heartfelt negative review surrounded by obviously fake or reactionary (do you really not see that?) positive reviews, that is a red flag. It is not uncommon.
- hn_throwaway_99 8y ago
  I totally disagree. When I read reviews (on Glassdoor or anywhere, really) I try to discount any emotionally charged content and focus on the factual elements of the reviews. I mean, "Political, negative work environment"? Every single group of humans since the beginning of time has a level of political interaction, so when I see comments about things being political I pretty much discount them unless there are some level of specifics. I've also seen folks make the "political" charge when what was really at issue is the person didn't communicate or work well with others, and it takes a level of emotional maturity to realize why this is important.
  - aerovistae 8y ago
    > factual elements of the reviews What facts can you really share though? This isn't a court situation, where evidence is scrutinized and held up to rigorous standards. So what are you really expecting? Transcripts of conversations? Financial documents? I don't really understand what kind of "facts" you would be looking for. Reviews are all about "how was your subjective experience there." If the answer is "awful, the company treated me poorly," then that's a legitimate review. Why would you discount it?

ducktypegoose 8y ago

How could someone write these words you quoted and not see the irony? I could understand wanting to respond to a scathing review you felt was unfair but it's one of those things as a normal person I would probably stop half way through and move on. Did this guy really keep going and post under different accounts? You're lucky you got out of there when you did.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

markbnj 8y ago

This is nothing more than my own opinion, formed over 25 years in software: look forward, not back. If you find yourself venting on a site like glassdoor stop and think it through. Yes ostensibly the point is to help others avoid a similar experience, but the reality is that relationships between employer and employee are so fraught with subjective qualities that it's very hard to say how generally applicable your personal experience is. If you can confine yourself to statements of fact - they have this policy or don't have that one - then that may be actually helpful. Having a bad experience with an employer, especially one that results in involuntary separation, can leave a lot of emotional baggage for you to deal with it. I'd say the last place you should deal with it is in public on a review site.

ben509 8y ago

That "Cons" is possibly the worst thing someone could post. That they hold a grudge when someone left is a _huge_ red flag.

skookumchuck 8y ago

Like everyone, I know lots of divorced couples. If you listen to the man, his ex is 100% to blame. If you listen to the woman, her ex is 100% to blame. So when I hear a rant from someone about their ex, their boss, etc., I nod sympathetically and think to myself "I wonder what that person would say about you."

aerovistae 8y ago
Agreed, I do the same. That said, for what it's worth, I've worked at five companies now and 3 out of 5 were great. The fourth is the one discussed in this thread, and the fifth had 3 hours of meetings per day for every engineer.

FilterSweep 8y ago

A previous employer would do the same thing. They would astroturf reviews whenever they received a bad one.

ubertaco 8y ago

Yeah, I left a negative review for a startup where I worked, and it was the first review (I actually had to create an entry for the startup in order to leave the review). I tried to be balanced about the things that attracted me there in the first place, and the kind of person who might be able to last a while there, but noted the downsides that drove me out. Within a month, four more reviews, all 5-star reviews with "cons" sections like "none" or "I don't like this particular office snack" popped up for this company that had existed without reviews for years, all of which were very obviously in the unusual and quite-recognizable writing style of the head sales guy (who was constantly recruiting because of his habit of scapegoating his 3-or-4-person sales team when the company did poorly, and thus firing and replacing all of them), down to his particular mannerisms that I hadn't heard from anyone else (with the same wording appearing in multiple reviews). I flagged these reviews as obviously by the same author, one who was an "executive" employee of the company, and that I was willing to provide samples to prove it. I've since re-flagged those reviews a few times before realizing that Glassdoor has no interest in responding. Since then, it appears that the same guy has taken to requiring his new hires (of which he has many, due to his high churn rate from firing and replacing every single BDR/SDR regularly) to write at least one glowing review on Glassdoor, which has grossly inflated the company's score. The lesson I learned from this experience was to skim positive reviews looking for dangerous euphemisms ("more than just a job" means "no work-life balance", "like a family" means "unprofessional (and often backstabbing) working relationships", "fast-paced" / "driven" / "high-performer" means again that no work-life balance exists) count the number of negative reviews as a health indicator, and read negative reviews looking for repeated themes to identify real problems. For example, a smallish (50 or so people) company I considered in my last job hunt had several negative reviews that contained phrases like "CEO conducts a whisper campaign against employees he doesn't like", and "getting on the CEO's bad side is easy and damning", while positive reviews said things like "not everyone can adapt to our flat structure" or "it's not for everyone", or "if you can learn to fit in, it's great". That sent the clear signal: there is no real reporting chain, just the CEO's capriciousness, and the CEO plays favorites (or "unfavorites") arbitrarily and heavy-handedly. The verdict: avoid this company. As with any source of user-submitted reviews online, you have to learn a certain degree of cynicism in order to arrive at an informed decision.