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Ask HN: Are Glassdoor reviews a reliable indicator of a company's culture?

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Re: Ask HN: Are Glassdoor reviews a reliable indicator of a company's culture?

#61
IMO, finding a job you like is so much about finding a place where you'll be able to tolerate the bad sides. Negative reviews are the best places to find that.

It's a fact of life that there are no perfect jobs, and the difference between happiness and soul crushing is often about how you can deal with the negative sides of your job.

Re: Ask HN: Are Glassdoor reviews a reliable indicator of a company's culture?

#63

Negative reviews are accurate I believe. Obviously you have to take them with a grain of salt but the positive ones seem to generally be written either by HR or through exhortation of the employee base to paint the company in a great light.

Well said.

Re: Ask HN: Are Glassdoor reviews a reliable indicator of a company's culture?

#65
post #34

In my experience, the negative ones are usually absolutely reliable! When I have left a place happy, I usually forget to write a good review. When I leave a place that was a nightmare to work at, I don't forget to spill the beans to warn people away. It's not uncommon for a company to have some sort of management shuffle, a new (worse) culture is imposed, and people start to leave and write negative reviews. Then the…

For the most part they can be reliable. However, there are bitter, cynical people out there who are let go for performance reasons and will speak negatively about their former employer and take no thought to point out the good parts. In other words, take reviews with a grain of salt.

Re: Ask HN: Are Glassdoor reviews a reliable indicator of a company's culture?

#66
post #34

In my experience, the negative ones are usually absolutely reliable! When I have left a place happy, I usually forget to write a good review. When I leave a place that was a nightmare to work at, I don't forget to spill the beans to warn people away. It's not uncommon for a company to have some sort of management shuffle, a new (worse) culture is imposed, and people start to leave and write negative reviews. Then the…

This is purely speculation, but I've often wondered if some of the inexplicable positive reviews at bad places I've worked are the product of the company HR team - I wouldn't be surprised at all if some companies try to game their glass door rating if it gets too bad. I've certainly worked some places where there were a bunch of positive reviews that looked suspiciously like the work of a single person.

Re: Ask HN: Are Glassdoor reviews a reliable indicator of a company's culture?

#67
post #48
post #34

In my experience, the negative ones are usually absolutely reliable! When I have left a place happy, I usually forget to write a good review. When I leave a place that was a nightmare to work at, I don't forget to spill the beans to warn people away. It's not uncommon for a company to have some sort of management shuffle, a new (worse) culture is imposed, and people start to leave and write negative reviews. Then the…

> Then the company will hire a firm to write them positive reviews One company (Series D, 300+ employees) that I worked at did this, sort of. It was less a hired firm, and more the CEO posting. > and the BS positive ones like 'it's a challenging place to work, the people posting negative reviews are used to workplaces where they need less initiative blah blah blah. Absolutely. There are a few key phrases that are hug…

There are bs reviews HR has added for our company, but there are also 3-4 star entries for current employees whose identifies I can guess based on their phrasing (I'm calling bs on any 5 star I see). There are also a few ridiculously negative ones left by people right after they were fired.

Re: Ask HN: Are Glassdoor reviews a reliable indicator of a company's culture?

#68
post #34

In my experience, the negative ones are usually absolutely reliable! When I have left a place happy, I usually forget to write a good review. When I leave a place that was a nightmare to work at, I don't forget to spill the beans to warn people away. It's not uncommon for a company to have some sort of management shuffle, a new (worse) culture is imposed, and people start to leave and write negative reviews. Then the…

"In my experience, the negative ones are usually absolutely reliable!" Yes. In my experience: Only people extremely pissed off take the time to open their macbook and write a truthful rage at 2am. There are good reviews, but they just don't have the same soul crushing honest factor. Comically, people think they are being anonymous -- but you can't soul crush without knowing -- and people (engineers) quickly put thing…

That doesn't make any sense. I've come across colleagues who wrote scathing reviews...typically consistent with their work ethic. Hard to work with, quick to blame others..then it's no surprise when they go to Glassdoor and say 'the people here are morons!' when they get let go for performance reasons.

Re: Ask HN: Are Glassdoor reviews a reliable indicator of a company's culture?

#69
post #34

In my experience, the negative ones are usually absolutely reliable! When I have left a place happy, I usually forget to write a good review. When I leave a place that was a nightmare to work at, I don't forget to spill the beans to warn people away. It's not uncommon for a company to have some sort of management shuffle, a new (worse) culture is imposed, and people start to leave and write negative reviews. Then the…

"In my experience, the negative ones are usually absolutely reliable!" Yes. In my experience: Only people extremely pissed off take the time to open their macbook and write a truthful rage at 2am. There are good reviews, but they just don't have the same soul crushing honest factor. Comically, people think they are being anonymous -- but you can't soul crush without knowing -- and people (engineers) quickly put thing…

Are you sure they think they are being anonymous?

Several years ago when I last posted a review on there o tried to explicitly call out my director for several things. They first wouldn't allow me to post his name and after I removed that I still had too much "identifying information" that I had to remove before it accepted my post.

Re: Ask HN: Are Glassdoor reviews a reliable indicator of a company's culture?

#70
post #54
post #34

In my experience, the negative ones are usually absolutely reliable! When I have left a place happy, I usually forget to write a good review. When I leave a place that was a nightmare to work at, I don't forget to spill the beans to warn people away. It's not uncommon for a company to have some sort of management shuffle, a new (worse) culture is imposed, and people start to leave and write negative reviews. Then the…

"and the BS positive ones like 'it's a challenging place to work, the people posting negative reviews are used to workplaces where they need less initiative blah blah blah." Nothing gets my goat more than this kind of thing. Suddenly, if I don't want to be harassed every day, I "can't hack it"?

Sometimes you can catch this in an interview, too, when you ask what happened to the previous person in the position (I always ask this question).

Usually it's simple like "they moved on" or "they were promoted". One time I got an angry, "Well they just couldn't handle it here!" Huge red flag

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