Pros
- Peers are amazing people, very fun to work with
- Food compensation for OT
- Office OPs team is great; they really try to make you feel at home
- Great first job out of college
- Benefits package is starting to grow out of "mom-and-pop" territory, with them covering health and life, but could be better given the valuable content the team produces.
Cons
Super-low rate for my role ($28/hr for a mid-tier position); expected to work OT to make up the difference for the market value of my position. Don't expect a COLA raise; you gotta work more OT to battle inflation. From what I know, Editors and Graphics get paid differently; they tend to favor the Editors. The workflow between editorial, graphics, and post creates too many bottlenecks.
They like to parade around the 5% 401k match, but that's a split match with a 3-5-year vesting period. If they don't plan on keeping you around that long, then the match perk has no point, and most people I met there get burnt out after 2-3 years.
Crediting work on a project is weird there; I trusted my supervisor to know which project to credit me on since there's a lot of use crossover, but nope, I've been snubbed more than a few times by them. The work my lead approved yet did not credit my name resulted in me being unable to use it for my portfolio. Hard to raise a concern when you don't want to rock the boat.
Communication with the management team needs work. The mid-management is great individually (except for the graphics lead), but not great at balancing work and notes with artists when multiple producers/creative directors are making conflicting demands on your time for their project simultaneously without communicating with each other. No PM, no HR, and too many producers will equal a very bad time for schedule.
Morale boosters are in the form of pizza parties and Amazon Visa gift cards; I'm not in high school anymore. No ladder of growth, will "carrot on a stick" you with a promotion, just gotta get lucky with how they feel. They have annual parties to look forward to, but trying to be a frat boy with people you work with ain't it anymore. I'm not a woman, but I highly advise women to steer clear of this place. This place has a dark history.
Will isolate you if you're not in with the "vibe". While this place isn't industry-level toxic with being in an open competition like they say their competitors are, they will subtly make you feel like you're in a competition way. There's the normal work gossip, but there's also isolation.
People stay there because it feels like a great work environment, but that's credited to the peers there, not the company. The company has no core values or any values for the matter. There are veterans there who have tenured their place there, but it's very hard for newer people to get to that level unless you are willing to "drink the Kool-Aid" or if you're fresh out of college and don't know any better. If you are older, then best of luck, or just go for it until another opportunity pops up (especially in this economy). Will say how terrible it is outside of Tiny Hero, but on the contrary, the friends I've made here that have left this place have nothing to say but how great it is after they left.
Don't be fooled, CEO = bad guy.