The startup that could have been... - Anonymous employee Envato Employee Review

The worst of middle managers were promoted, and those with heart and vision were either directly fired, or driven out by a culture that's fast turning cold and corporate. Short-term minded, marketing-over-product, growth hacking, Type-A, Harvard MBA, military-style agile coaching won the day. Vision, design thinking, warmth, product-first mentality, innovation, all lost. HR is a clique. Don't ever go to them if you really need anything more than an ergonomic stand for your desk. They are there to defend the status quo, and don't even think of going to them for a complaint about someone higher up in the chain of command. They're best buddies. Little care about the community. The company preaches community earnings, community this, community that. But then when it's actually time to back up this preaching of "community first", they take over 50% of the earnings from authors. Lol, what!? Only the best of authors will get a fair cut of the earnings. Ironically the top authors already make so much money they don't need it nearly as much as the authors desperately trying to make a full-time living from their work on Envato Market.