Plenty of Fish Reviews

Pros

Good HR, Good Managers Good leaders They support good ideas. They care about their employees and if you want to learn they definitely support you - (sending to conferences and classes)

Cons

Some code is legacy and should reimplement them.

Advice to Management

it isn't so clear how the bonus percentage calculate for each employee.

Pros

-A great overall work environment -Friendly staff with young, spunky demeanor -Nice perks like flex days, free snacks, and drinks, catered lunches during special events, lunch and learns. -Open concept office / great views -The company promotes personal and career growth -Competitive benefits package -Lots of social events like Friday happy hour, and parties -Hackathons events dedicated to working on... something you enjoy, either for yourself or the company. -Free in-house fitness classes during lunch for after work

Cons

-High expectations to know everything -Job description scope creep -Very lean team with large demanding responsibilities -Heavy micromanagement (my way, full stop) -Opinions voiced are often vetoed -Team focus can change without any warning (non-emergency) -Highly disruptive environment due to constant issues -Knowledge retention and documentation is low due to the high rate of change -The high on-call... frequency with instant response expectations (unpaid) -Team members are undervalued and told so -Unspoken expectations of following the team chat 24/7 -Dedicated surveillance camera trained on the team area -The team is treated like a kindergarten class when being corralled to group meetings. -Critical events are usually downplayed to avoid scrutiny from upper management. - (HR: Get ready for all of this to be downplayed/obfuscated)

Advice to Management

The operations team needs a complete overhaul of its workflow and mentality. As agility is important in an application where quick iterations are important, it has no place in an operations based environment. Proper time taken into planning and implementing will ensure a stable platform for developers to work with. As critical events are generally downplayed, there is a sense of complacency across the company that... this is normal. This is doing no one any favors. Upper management needs to start asking the hard questions into why this is occurring. To back up this behavior; the company has a mantra of “Done is better than perfect!”. It’s framed and hangs proudly on a wall, CROOKED. When will the management understand that this does not instill stability, but rather the lack of effort and pride to get something done right? It may come across as a funny talking point, but the joke has run its course. The end result is a burnt out team from constant firefighting with no motivation or time to improve upon things that matter. Team dialogue should take a reciprocal approach rather than a one-way conversation. In most cases, the team is told what to do and left with no context. They are left to fend for themselves and feedback is usually provided in a binary fashion. Due to the lack of transparency, and in most cases little to no context and planning, there is little opportunity to take initiatives to work towards a bigger goal. This is reflected in the fact that there has only been one promotion to "lead" in the last 5+ years. The team is smart and (was) eager; listen to them, if they don’t align with the overall goals, train them, be transparent with them, involve them in the planning process, show them the bigger picture, make communal decisions, mentor them. Don’t berate them for their inabilities, instead, equip them for success before “throwing them in the deep end” The dictatorship has to end. Facetious suggestion: Start monitoring moral of all teams and set up threshold and STDEV alerts for it. Clearly, it's not being monitored nor considered.  For anyone external reading, this is just reflective of the operations team. In no way does this describe other departments at Plenty of Fish. Heads up: Interviews are intense and could take several meetings. This is mostly vetting to ensure you can mentally endure the demands and expectations of this job. Pre-requisites core skills are just a fish and bait. With the job description scope creep, you'll be told that a new core skill is required of you and to go "figure it out". Last CEO was cool...

Pros

Excellent people throughout. People enjoy having fun, and people crack a joke now and then even at critical times, which shows that everyone is keeping their head. The work is challenging but never "ok everyone come in Saturday" challenging. That's why I say it's fun and challenging but not to the point of IT cliche, where either the place seems out of control or you're overworked to death.

Cons

Very complicated infrastructure means there's a huge learning curve. Junior folks with junior skills would not do well here unless they're exceptionally fast learners and excel in other areas.

Advice to Management

Management has already taken employee advice (from already-happy employees) and has been acting strongly on it since last summer.

Pros

Great coworkers, amazing perks and a transparent inclusive corporate culture. Very diverse and empowering environment. Extra perks: lunch and learns, and snacks, fitness classes in house :) Health Insurance · Vacation & paid time off · Dental and vision Care

Cons

there are limited career growth opportunities in the Customer Service Section.

Pros

From day 1 I felt very welcome and as a real member of the team. POF is a dynamic, competitive, positive company that provides a friendly work environment where people are valued and considered as key to the business. I feel that my opinion is important and that my performances are fairly assessed. Benefits are great, salary is competitive and I totally adhere to the the values

Cons

Nothing special to mention here

Pros

- Great Location. Lovely 360 Degree views from office. - Management is genuinely interested in employees' well-being and development. - The company makes investments in the technical growth of employees. - The new leadership has an honest interest in fixing the problems. - Never seen such amazing snack options. - Approachable HRs. - BEST work-life balance EVER

Cons

- Open office space can be a bit distracting at times, so invest in good quality headphones.

Advice to Management

Keep up the great work!

Pros

Pays well. Long lunches. Beautiful view. Many nice agreeable people (the meek ones last). Can get away with doing very little - in fact, rewarded for doing what you're told, not for doing a good job.

Cons

Bullying culture. The new ownership seems to have made some difference, but the original bullies (exec management) still in place, and set the tone.

Advice to Management

Hire professionals at the executive level.

Pros

People working here are really good at what they do. There is plenty of opportunity to learn and grow. Office location is excellent for commuters and employment perks are great. You get to see your work impact literally millions of users daily.

Cons

Collaboration between different teams could be better. CSR and rest of the company sees each other as people from different planets. Granted, I am one of the newer hires so this might be biased since I do not know everyone yet.

Advice to Management

Find a venue or a method to share internal knowledge and lessons learned. Management should present and collate case studies and make the transfer of the tribal to new hires easier.