Birst Reviews

Pros

-This is a great place to advance your career in software sales. If you are looking to be part of a world class team and company this is a place to be. - World class training and support so that a future leader in the space has the proper tool to learn and grow

Cons

-There are none that i can think of

Advice to Management

-Keep up the good work. This is a team that is going very far and will be a force to be reckoned with very soon.

Pros

Not much good to say about it. Most of the people who worked there were solid and dependable. Sales leadership was awful and the founders seemed in over their heads.

Cons

Too many to list. Product wasn't ready for the enterprise yet CEO/found constantly tried to push it. Company would have been better off focusing on an OEM business model. Bigger deals. Lower cost of customer acquisition. Smaller sales team needed. Stickier product.

Advice to Management

Now that the company has been firesold to Infor for half of what the VC's invested, a lot of people who worked there feel pretty burned. I haven't heard from any of the former employees that would ever work for the two founders again. So what's the point of giving them any advice? They wouldn't listen anyways.

Pros

Best Marketing Team ever. Accomplished a lot on a small budget. All employees opinions valued.

Cons

Not enough budget given to Marketing

Advice to Management

Good luck with Infor.

Pros

Excellent work-life balance Central Location Diverse culture Work from home optional Excellent team & accommodating management Excellent freedom & growth opportunities Free snacks, occasional lunches (3-6x per month), opt-in dinners (6x per month)

Cons

With the acquisition, many good people transitioned elsewhere Somewhat spaghetti codebase (growing pains)

Advice to Management

Don't put off the 1:1 meetings despite a busy schedule, it's always beneficial to do them.

Pros

-learned a lot -paid well -flexible vacation policy -became close with some of my team members

Cons

My team: -extreme micro management -terrible hours- most SDRs work 12 hour days and some brag about working weekends -poor culture: cold, aggressive -extremely difficult to hit quota. They were dishonest about this during the interview process -very poor promotion path. It is almost impossible to get promoted from an SDR to an AE. AEs here are in their 30s-50s, much more tenured, and hired from outside of the company...

Advice to Management

See above

Pros

Decent Company with decent benefits

Cons

No retirement benefits plans such as 401K

Advice to Management

Management should hear to its employees and take their feedback.

Pros

The pay was good for the industry.

Cons

Management is terrible. I've never seen anything like this. Everyone on my team was depressed and looking for other jobs. The managers would make us cry with mean and rude comments. I would get anxious before every one-on-one. Additionally the C-suite is impersonal and not transparent. Even within my team there were all these secret meetings I wasn't a part of. Most stressful time in my life was working at Birst.

Advice to Management

Treat employees with the respect they deserve.

Pros

1) Great SDR Team 2) If you like being led by an intense coach on a sports team, this is the place for you (so many sports references)

Cons

1) Terrible work environment - get used to being yelled at like you are always 5 TDs behind. 2) Lots of meetings, not much development. 3) Unrealistic quota goals - you feel like the ax is going to fall on you all the time. 4) Ridiculous work hours - you are given credit for working nights, weekends 5) ZERO growth path - see other posts, it's 100% true.

Advice to Management

- Assuming that tons of meetings + long hours = "crushing" quota is insanely simplistic. Everyone needs to be developed differently and treated that way - Stop treating your employees like players that can be yelled into submission, and start treating them like human beings (and seriously, tone it down with the sports references).