Not a good place at any point in your career - Anonymous employee Criteo Employee Review

1.0
Dec 4, 2018
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Boy oh boy, have I been waiting to write this review. I have been at Criteo for a sufficient amount of time to see the company go from a small BCN office where everyone was each others friend to the giant mess it became today. Only now I realise how many snakes there were (and still are) in the management, how necessary a French passport is to be promoted and how little I should have expected from this company at all. Let me kick this off with a few positive points: - You get well paid. Barcelona is a relatively cheap city (though getting more expensive), which Criteo knows very well. They pay you well so you don't complain, sit quiet and do your job without providing any sort of criticism. Be careful - if you get relocated as a new employee and get fired within the first 6 months you have to pay back the relocation bonus. Happened to many times. - Office is amazing. Great views, you get free breakfast (as you do in all Criteo offices), there is ticket restaurant (free lunch), by the beach. - Some employees you can actually learn a lot from and become friends with. Enjoy while they're there - high probability that they will be leaving soon!

Cons

After working for a long time for a company you would expect to be the go to point in case of issues, be acknowledged and be promoted. Not at Criteo Barcelona, here you simply get ignored, nobody cares about your opinion if you are not in a management position (where you only get to if you are French of have French friends). If you intend to get promoted expect to be spending your after works at Barnabier on the "management table", the one where all the managers gather and only people who want to be promoted try to glue themselves on. If you try to get promoted like in any normal company (working hard and being there for your colleagues), you get forgotten - they will do their best to make you get pissed off so that you leave yourself and they don't have to pay the golden handshake fee. To the juniors out there - stay home in your cold countries, do not be deceived by Criteo HR promising your amazing views and spamming their Linkedin profiles with it. It's all a nice cover for the mess that's actually happening inside and you will find out very soon after joining.

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Criteo Response
7y
Thank you for your feedback. We take all constructive feedback seriously. The leadership and People experience team are working together to ensure there are opportunities for everyone and to make this a happy and fair place to work. The fact still remains that we are in a transition phase. While it comes with its challenges, we are committed (no matter what) to do our very best to make the employee experience a great one. Regards, Shruthi Chindalur, Regional Managing Director – EMEA MM

Explore other reviews about Criteo

5.0
Jun 8, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Great environment, great people to work with

Cons

Need to go back to office

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Criteo Response
4d
We're thrilled to receive such positive feedback and to know that you've found a place where you can grow and thrive at Criteo. Thank you for sharing and for your trust all these years. It's great to have you on the team!
2.0
Jan 31, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Smart, hardworking people at the individual contributor level (many of whom are now gone). Little micro-managing, but that’s because everyone’s bandwidth is near 0

Cons

Post–new CEO, the company has descended into complete chaos. There is no transparency around decisions that impact teams and roles. There have been consistent strategy, personnel, and supplier changes with no explanation, accountability, or follow-through. Cons, continued: Employee input and performance do not matter. Decisions feel driven by appeasing BoD and optics rather than results, input and reality. The culture has become a corporate hellscape of: Endless reorganizations with no clear rationale, including layoffs with no reasoning Vague all-hands meetings that avoid real issues, even when directly asked A massive disconnect between the C-suite and day-to-day reality Eroded trust and growing position insecurity Middle managers incentivized to prioritize managing up & executive optics over team advocacy “Return to Office” policy put in place when promised a “Work from Anywhere” position, where the RTO policy differs across employees’ location Little to no growth opportunities despite high performance Under-market average compensation that was justified by locale, “Work from Anywhere”, and flexibility — which was recently rolled back A clear favoritism to those that “talk the talk” vs “performance with numbers”

10
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