Adknowledge Reviews

Pros

Company is growing really fast. The management is smart, understand the business well and takes good decisions in the best interest of the company and its employees. There are good opportunities to learn the business and growth with this organization. There is very little politics and focus is on results.

Cons

Company is led by a young and aggressive CEO who at times likes to see things in a certain way.

Advice to Senior Management

1. Show the employees that management is actively listening to employees.

2. Create a program where employees are encouraged to apply for open positions with-in the organization after they have completed 18-24 months at any role. This will allow Acknowledge to create synergies among the teams and the employees can learn more about different groups and would stay longer with the company.

Pros

Great environment to work in. Has some technical challenges as they mature, but overall very good. Great opportunities to learn new things, and advance your skills. Creative thinking is encouraged and rewarded. They have a big focus on morale and team-work. They really seem to understand that happy employees work better. Very fast paced environment so you won't be sitting around on any one task for too long. Boredom is not a problem.

Cons

Only downside I see is the hours. Having the additional 30 minutes can be a strain for those employees with families/kids as it can really cut into those activities.

Advice to Senior Management

Consider dropping the additional 30 minutes to the workday. Maybe look at adding in some small window of flex hours. (Maybe allow start/stop times to vary within a 1 hour window).

Pros

Salary/Benefits were good, office was nice, some nice fun co-workers, free lunch once a week. The work was interesting and challenging.

Cons

No professional management, no written office policies, management does what is best for them which includes making things up as they go. Everyone walks on eggshells around the president/ceo as if he is the messiah. No one stands up to him.

Advice to Senior Management

Get a written office manual, communicate with employees, don't make up policies as you go. Take care of your employees; they are your greatest asset.

Pros

Friendly staff, relaxed environment, great benefits

Cons

Managers are not very encouraging, motivational or helpful. They seem out for themselves only.

Advice to Senior Management

Reach out to your employees more.

Pros

In 2007 ADK ended with a third of the employees and a quarter of the profit they ended with in 2009, this place is a rocket ship. Most of the complaints I have read here are factually correct but come from people who would likely enjoy working at a bigger company. I particularly liked the comment one reviewer wrote about giving their multi-million dollar idea away 'for free' - that's what your salary is for. If you want to go and do that idea yourself then start your own company.

If you like a challenge, hate doing the same thing from day to day and view your time at Adknowledge about learning how to thrive at a startup then this is the place for you. Otherwise, stay away. All startups are messy, inefficient places. The people who do well at them don't want to mess around with process (aka 'bureaucracy'), love a fast pace and shrug off the other cr*p.

Other highlights:

- still not too much office politics, CEO usually cracks down on egotistical VPs
- engineers are respected generally and not treated like second class citizens
- lots of savvy people, almost everyone has a 'project on the side' or wants to
- strong bonds with colleagues at your level
- cost of living is really low, even the junior staff can afford a place of their own if they watch their money carefully
- shorter hours than any other startup I've worked up, I got to see my partner most evenings for dinner

Cons

The CEO is a young, very clever and highly energetic entrepreneur who would benefit from laying off a bit. Many seemingly crazy ideas that emanate from the execs are often imposed by him.

The Kansas City office has gotten a lot slower since the CEO moved to New York and sometimes we get blasted by a 'work harder' email, which I think is not the best way to incentivize people to do more.

After a couple of down years in the job market, the company is way behind on pay levels and needs to address these urgently.

Kansas City is HOT in the summer and even COLDER in the winter! You get to spend about six weeks a year outside, the rest of the time you stay bundled up in your home/car/office/bar.

Publicly there is a culture of accountability but the reality is this is applied inconsistently. Some stars who get a bad attitude can take months to get a warning (or worse) whereas others just disappear one day. Flip side of this is that when things go wrong initially they don't shoot the messenger generally.

It's a startup people. Can be frustrating when dumb details get dropped in the melee.

Advice to Senior Management

Your staff got you to where you are today, they can do a lot more if you just give them the chance. Morale would improve dramatically if there was less micro-management or better pay. Do both and nobody would ever leave.

Pros

In stark contrast to some of the reviews posted here, I love my job and I'm generally very satisfied with the company. It should be mentioned that Adknowledge is taking steps to become a more personable company; this includes the recent hiring of a VP of HR.

There have only been a few instances where I worked late; more often than not it was due to me just getting wrapped up in what I was doing and losing track of time. Nobody is cracking a whip or coming up with unrealistic deadlines.

 Perhaps it depends on what channel you work in, but some of the other reviews specifically mention scenarios I have never seen. For instance, when I come into work (on time) it's usually a ghost town. Same for when I leave; everyone usually gets up and leaves within 30 minutes of the end of business. That doesn't seem like the backbreaking 70-hr workweek environment I hear mentioned in other reviews...

One of the things I really like about Adknowledge is that managers are expected to be working managers. They are in cubes just like everyone else. In other words, there are no corner offices to complete for. Like it or not, you can't deny that Adknowledge tries their best to maximize ROI on every level of the company.

Having worked for many other companies, it's my belief that Adknowledge is really doing a lot of things right. Yes, the interview process is long and arduous, but the ultimate effect is that everyone has baseline intelligence and ability which exceeds many other companies. Additionally, everyone is up-to-speed on what they're doing and is generally at the top of their game. The company has no dusty old employees which just don't understand these "newfangled computer gizmos" and this is true for every department at all levels.

Cons

The primary downside right now is Adknowledge's reputation amongst developers in the local community. Adknowledge has a lot of disgruntled ex-employees sprinkled around; it's the company that everyone has heard a horror story about, it seems. Our reputation (and an inequality in pay) prevents us from attracting a lot of top-tier local talent from other companies. At a certain level, your best and most effective employees have to be lured away from their current positions with other companies and Adknowledge just doesn't have that pull yet.

Some people in Adknowledge management do pay too close attention to what time a developer's butt hits their chair in the morning. They haven't yet learned the lesson that 8 hours from an effective developer is worth 16 hours from an ineffective one. There are shocking and frankly hilarious company-wide emails that go out about this phenomenon sometimes.

Advice to Senior Management

none

Pros

Some of the management is very nice and easy to work with. The salaries are higher than average and you will receive many perks including free lunches, 3 weeks vacation, cheap insurance, and free soda.

Cons

This place will work you very very long hours depending on the position you have. The team I was on was incredibly high stress and they expect you to learn at an incredibly fast pace. If family life is important to you or free time I would say work someplace else.

I hope I never have a job like this again.

Advice to Senior Management

Don't be so rude and have more patience with new employees.

Pros

The benefits package is spectacular and the pay is generous. Everything employees do impacts the company in very real and significant ways. Other employees are always spectacular to deal with and everyone has their act together. There is always something new to accomplish and to keep busy with.

Cons

Things can seem too fast paced, but this is only because there is actual work to do. It is easy to get lost in the day-to-day activities, but this is a good problem to have since there is always important work to do.

Advice to Senior Management

Management could improve most by providing more insight on the long-term goals of the business as well as instruction on task prioritization for employees on the larger, more active teams.

Pros

Think for a second how many people you know who have been affected by some type of job fluctuation over the last few years? (Laid off, salary cut, benefits cut, demotion, etc.) I even heard some of my friends tell me their company cut the holiday party last year to save some pennies. None of this has happened at Adknowledge. Last year we even added a Social Committee to increase employee participation/appreciation activities.

In the last 3 years Adknowledge has gone from 50+ employees to 250+ employees through hiring and acquisition and they are continuing to grow. They always have 15 or more openings that are new additions to the teams (not replacements). Adknowledge also gives $1000 referral hiring bonus.

The culture here is wonderful, small teams with a work hard, get it done mentality and the employees are top class. It’s a place where specific business goals/priorities are set every week and everyone aggressively pursues to achieve the results. The smaller teams give everyone an opportunity to add input on business decisions. Management doesn’t micro-manage - every employee holds themselves accountable for their own actions.

Pay & benefits are wonderful and a lot of positions have additional bonuses based on achieving outstanding performance.

Technology is top notch! I am able to get things accomplished any where and at any time.

It’s been amazing working for a growth company and I can’t wait to see how we progress in the coming years.

Cons

Money is not spent on a corporate training department - Employees must manage their own personal development and not rely on the company to do it for them. Even though this is a down side, most of the people I know don’t wait for someone to tell them; they are always looking for ways to improve or learn the latest stuff.

If you are looking for a corporate ladder; that is not how our structure is set up. You can view that as a plus or minus.

We are not an 8-5 company; our business hours are 8:00 – 5:30. Some of us work days, online some nights and weekends, and responding to emails at odd hours. Again, you may view this as a con but I like the fact that we have challenging, engaging environment. We are a 24/7 operation, we should focus on what gets done vs. how many hours or days we work. Management is very supportive when I do need time off.

Advice to Senior Management

Every company is not perfect, things I think Adknowledge could improve upon: communication, performance reviews/feedback, recognition and consistency.

Pros

I was with AdKnowledge for a little more than a year in 2009. Like many other people said here, it's the biggest company you've never heard of. The company tries to create a laid-back internet company type atmosphere, which is nice (casual dress, free lunch, free soft drinks, etc.) but doesn't go much deeper than what's on the surface.

AdKnowledge really shines when it comes to employee benefits- super inexpensive health insurance and 3 weeks of paid vacation are just a couple of the perks.

Cons

As a Sr Level Developer, my experience with AdKnowledge was terrible. The companies infrastructure is a mess. Everyone is a cowboy coder, there is absolutely no documentation for any of the products, no unit tests, and version control is just a token gesture that some of the developers use, some of time.

In my experience, many of the developers at AdKnowledge don't take the time to plan out their code before starting to program. Lots of code is just thrown together and kept running 'as long as it works'. This means you'll be babysitting many legacy systems that sort of work. Things change so fast, you will find that most of your projects get canned before they see the light of day.

Leaving AdKnowledge was the best decision I ever made.

* Working 10-12 hours per day is expected, working weekends is expected, being on call 24/7 is expected, working paid holidays is expected.
* If you are not working on their email platform, expect to get treated like a second grader. The email team gets top priority on everything and has even "borrowed" servers that my team was using.
* IT Ops is a nightmare. Need root access or a simple package to be installed on your system? Expect to wait 48 hours for a response. The sys admins are notoriously "right", and will question every decision you make as a developer. "Why would you WANT to install THAT?"
* If it ain't broke, don't fix it attitude towards everything.
* If you want a better computer besides the 3-year-old laptop that they give you, you'll have to pay for it out of pocket. Want a mac or a monitor bigger than 15" inches? Forget about it.

Advice to Senior Management

Give your programmers some freedom. Give them a budget for training and conferences. Put a priority on quality and documentation versus lines of code and who can get it done the fastest.