Great Culture, But Be Prepared for Constant Changes - Customer Insights Researcher Cengage Employee Review

5.0
Jun 7, 2024
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Work-Life Balance: The company values work-life balance, making it easier to manage personal and professional commitments. Remote-First Policy: While the company primarily supports remote work, some exceptions do apply. Decent Benefits: The benefits package includes healthcare and dental coverage with around 80% of premiums covered (depending on role and chosen plan). Vision, legal, and other optional benefits are available at an additional cost, with a similar cost-sharing structure. PTO & holidays are in line with comparative US companies. Professional Development: There is robust support for professional growth, including access to online learning and reimbursement for certain educational certifications or degrees.

Cons

Inconsistent Remote Policy: Despite employee feedback, there has been a push for local employees to come into the office once a week. Frequent Restructuring: The company undergoes frequent changes and restructuring, including recent large-scale layoffs, creating an uncertain environment. Non-Competitive Compensation: Compensation is not as competitive compared to similar roles in other industries.

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Cengage Response
2y
Thank you for taking the time to leave a detailed review about your experience. It’s great to hear that you have achieved a healthy work-life balance, that you are satisfied with our professional development opportunities and that you enjoy many of the benefits that we provide. Regarding remote work, a majority of Cengage Group employees remain virtual first. While most teams have operated successfully in a remote environment, for the past few years, we also believe that regular opportunities to meet and collaborate in-person add value and increase effectiveness for certain groups. We appreciate that this change requires coordination and planning. We’ve taken great care to introduce this change to affected groups with as much notice as possible before adopting an OfficeFlex Model later this year. In terms of recent changes to the business, my goal and that of the entire leadership team has been to lead with transparency and create opportunities for open dialogue – whether through written communications, First Friday forums or town halls with leaders in the businesses. In terms of compensation, as an organization we have worked hard to ensure our total rewards are competitive with the market and that employees are fairly compensated for the work they are responsible for. Our HR teams closely monitor the market to ensure our compensation is competitive. I encourage you to reach out to me directly with more feedback on how we can continue to improve. Best, Michael Hansen, CEO

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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