employer cover photo
employer logo
employer logo

UniKey Technologies

Is this your company?

8 year old "startup" with great engineers and clueless management - Anonymous employee UniKey Technologies Employee Review

1.0
Feb 10, 2018
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Every team is filled with the smartest people I've ever worked with. Everyone is willing to stop what they're doing and try to help out. The company has enough opportunity to be very successful _if_ it can figure out it's management and trust problems.

Cons

Management encourages an "ask questions" culture, but ultimately uses it as a way to weed out dissenters. They appear to seek out yes-men style attitudes. If you ask questions they say you aren't giving them solutions, if you give solutions they say you aren't asking the right questions. When all else fails, they fall back on the "we're a startup" mentality. Management seemingly doesn't know how to run an engineering group from a high level. When a problem occurs they reorganize the company. While I can admire a company's willingness to change, altering roles every 3 to 6 months leads to a high stress environment where it's very difficult to settle into your role and be effective. There is a large trust problem at Unikey. Teams don't trust other teams. The leads don't trust management. Management doesn't trust the leads. Which all stems from ongoing communication issues and general lack of understanding between everybody.

avatar
UniKey Technologies Response
8y
Thanks for sharing your feedback. UniKey has certainly experienced a fair amount of growth and change recently, but we are focused on encouraging a culture of trust and open communication with leadership. Thank you for your review and we wish you the best in your next endeavor.

Explore other reviews about UniKey Technologies

5.0
Oct 29, 2018
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Great team, Work from home days, lenient hours, pets allowed, fully stocked kitchen, Unlimited Vacation, Opportunity to try new things and bring new ideas to the table

Cons

No specific work hours so it's a little grey on when the day starts and when it ends

1.0
Feb 9, 2018
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The concept and the technology are interesting and cutting edge. Incredible talent density and some of the nicest people I have ever worked with.

Cons

Since January the QA manager has left, two of the most senior web engineers have left, the project manager left, the last remaining co-founder has left and is contacting everyone trying to sell his shares, the COO resigned yesterday for "family reasons" and the company delayed everyones paycheck last week due to "best practices" which makes absolutely no sense. Several people did not know about the "best practice" payroll change announcement until their paycheck didn't show up on time because it was never communicated in writing ahead of time. We did get paid today thank God. To date nobody has been hired to replace any of the people that have left which has caused even more concerns about the company finances. I would sum it up as the wild west where the managers are in over their head and don't know how to run a business. There is no structure or consistency in what is expected day to day. It's a shame because there is so much opportunity and the people are so nice and get along so well. The atmosphere in the office is pretty defeated, feels like a sinking ship.

5
avatar
UniKey Technologies Response
8y
We appreciate the candid feedback and review. We have certainly experienced a lot of changes recently and we understand how this can make for a stressful environment. We believe that the changes we are implementing will bring the most value to you, as an employee, as well as our partners as the company continues to rapidly expand. We hear your feedback and are doing our best to encourage a culture of trust with open communication.
See reviews by: Helpful|Rating|Date|All