No hard lines taken - Product Manager Cengage Employee Review

3.0
Oct 21, 2013
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Very flexible and great people (fringe benefits and regular benefits have seriously been deteriorating over the years)

Cons

First things first - private equity really drove this company into a downward spiral as most folks know. They put way too much debt onto the company, taking a highly profitable company and turning it backwards (leadership all had to focus on paying back the debt for so long that they didn't focus on making the company keep growing). Beyond that general statement this review is specifically for Gale - Gale was a wonderful company for many years - truly standing by its mission to help educate and lift up the community it served. It was a great place to work. But leadership lost focus and it's very hard for folks at Gale to take the hard lines that need to be taking (cutting the fat -takes years to do this); putting the right people in leadership roles (one gentleman has a very high position and has a terrible track record and is derogatory toward everyone especially women yet keeps getting promoted); debt forces too many short-term decisions instead of looking 5 years down the road.

Explore other reviews about Cengage

3.0
Jun 4, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Company has some interesting approaches to the market and in the past they seemed value employees. There are some good employees there and there was, in the past, visionary leadership, but the people with the vision and leadership skills left the company a few years ago.

Cons

The company actively de-values employees. They had a project they called "Project Horizon" where they told all employees they needed to cut costs, so the company was going to have multiple layoffs over 3-5 years - but nobody was allowed to know when, where, or why - - just one day large swaths of people would be gone. That hung over everyone's heads - for years, and is indicative of how Cengage values employees - it doesn't. Everything is about trying to secure new funding and prepare for an IPO, so they stopped investing significantly in the products about 3 years ago and that's about when they stopped acting like they cared about employee wellness as well.

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