Six Apart Reviews

Pros

friendly environment, great management, hands on work, room for recognition, benefits,

Cons

never had any problems working there.

Advice to Senior Management

great management, maybe could push interns to do more work

Pros

Stock options, the stocked kitchen, friday-afternoon drinking

Cons

Long hours, stressing about competition with wordpress.

Advice to Senior Management

Keep it up! I had a great time working for you.

Pros

Amazingly smart, focused people. Fun atmosphere. Awesome product.

Cons

Occasionally long hours. Can't use wordpress.

Advice to Senior Management

You're doing a great job.

Pros

Six Apart is one of the few innovative companies around. Few possess the will that Six Apart does to create for creations' sake, and generally for the benefit of others. The people who work there are brilliant and I have the utmost respect for all of them.

Cons

While one of its greatest assets is its creativity and the freedom it gives to its engineers to innovate, (something I would never want 6A to sacrifice BTW), it also suffers from "bright shinny object" syndrome. In other words, product teams, while driven, are permitted too often to pursue *major* distractions, like building entirely new products that take valuable resources away from the products that need them.

However the most challenging aspect of working at Six Apart is a complete lack of upward mobility. It is virtually impossible for employees to reach the standard set by executives, unless you are within an exclusive set of social circles that exist among the intellectuals that drive the company.

Finally, and the greatest irony for a company that practically invented blogging, Six Apart has extraordinarily poor communication with its users and community. Any positive examples that can be pointed to, are the result of the personal initiative taken by individuals and is not a part of corporate culture. In fact, the communication culture of Six Apart is just the opposite: overly edited and masterfully spun within an inch of its truthiness.

Advice to Senior Management

Make some hard decisions and cut some products loose (not including the Media and Services devisions). Let the one or ones that matter take center stage and throw the weight of the entire company behind them.

Reward your employees with more than popsicles on a hot day. Given them the compensation and promotions they earn and deserve.

Invest in your community.

Blog more.

Pros

Six Apart pays reasonably well compared to similar companies, they have an excellent benefits package, and the office is conveniently located and comfortable to work in. The typical Six Apart employee is young, energetic, and extremely good at what they do. Six Apart maintains high standards for all of their employees.

Cons

The learning curve can be very steep for new employees. Training is informal, and internal documentation is inconsistent, incomplete, and sometimes even outdated and wrong. There is a lot of talk about improving documentation, but it is rare that anything is done. There is always a lot of work to be done, and the team is small. The job can be very stressful at times, and it can be hard to maintain a "normal" personal life.

Advice to Senior Management

Six Apart seems understaffed to me. Shortcuts are taken because sometimes there simply is not enough time to do everything that needs to be done right.