Cengage Reviews

Pros

Accessibility to upper leadership Feel valued Work Life Balance Good management Company culture

Cons

Need more consistent sales tools

Pros

The company leadership is thoughtful and transparent with the employees. Things got tough in the economy with the pandemic, but the leadership kept us in the loop of what was happening and started meeting with us weekly to keep a dialog going about leadership decisions that impact employees and the business. We're all dedicated to learning both for ourselves and for our customers. It's great to come to work everyday and know you're contributing to improvements in education throughout the world. Cengage's products are educational, but we're a technology company. Our technology teams implement agile methodologies. Since I have a background in IT project management, that's important to me.

Cons

Because we're a global company, team communications can be a challenge.

Pros

-I've never worked for a company so transparent about everything from the business strategy to the financial state of the company. The radical transparency starts at the top with our CEO, who leads weekly meetings on Zoom with all employees including "ask me anything" sessions where he answers the top up-voted questions on Slack (which can be anything on employee's minds). This candid mentality is something I've seen in my managers as well, I always know where I stand and how I'm performing and know how the business is doing. -Great work life balance -Everyone here cares about you as a person, and wants to help you succeed. Everyone is also really passionate about the education space, and is working here because they want to make a difference. -Cengage has a great professional development framework, with many opportunities for learning on the job. -Cengage has dedicated resources to I&D and inclusion and diversity is a big focus of the company.

Cons

-The publishing / edtech industry is in evolution, so strategies are always evolving.

Pros

Incredible transparency from CEO; employees empowered to challenge the status quo; constant test, try, learn, repeat. In my experience, the culture is very inclusive -- anyone with a view, suggestion or idea is encouraged to speak up no matter the role, team, level within the organization.

Cons

Ambitious strategy to reinvent education is not for everyone. If we want to impact learners, and help them improve their lives, we can't be complacent. As we continue to transform to best meet the needs of our customers, there will be continuous improvement efforts. This can lead to work / life balance challenges.

Pros

#1 Reason is the people. I have great co-workers I can reach out to for anything I need and even though we are spread across the whole country, especially during the pandemic, I feel super supported. The culture is absolutely inclusive, positive (rare for a sales role) and is truthful. Many of us were teachers before and you can definitely tell. This job attracts straight-A students.

Cons

Your first year is extremely challenging because there is so much to learn. You will never be an expert on everything and need to learn to be ok with that. Bonuses are paid out once a year which is hard to budget for. I had to learn to actually schedule time in my day for work/life balance because it is so easy to become a workaholic in this role. Management encourages it but I always felt behind! The workload is cyclical meaning you will work evenings and weekends for a couple of weeks a quarter and then have some time to relax and recharge after the rush is over.

Pros

-Work culture -Coworkers/Managers are great -Benefits are insane, plenty of Vacation days and Benefit time off -The job generally isn't that bad, this is just a textbook/online learning company so we barley get rude/unhappy customers, and you're usually off the phones doing special projects at least once a week. -Supervisors are open/willing to help you move into other departments if you're interested in other positions at Cengage

Cons

-Starting pay is okay, but could be much better. People have left Cengage and go to other companies just because their starting pay is like $18, and I dont blame them. I love my co-workers and supervisors and that keeps me here, but I can understand why people would leave Cengage and go elsewhere if we cant even start out at a better pay rate. -Raises do not happen often and when they do its for basically nothing, you only get them every 2, 5, 10, etc... years and the most you can get each time is $.38. I have been here for almost 3 years and because of this policy I would have to be here for another 2 years just to get another $.38 cent raise and STILL not be at a full $1.00 raise? That definitely needs to be worked on.

Pros

The mindset, the people, the learning opportunities

Cons

Leadership is often blind to the fact that the staff they have on hand already could solve most of their business problems easily if they were given the opportunity

Pros

working in education feels good, the benefits are okay, they're responsive to social issues

Cons

no raises or cost-of-living increases in *years*, many people have their positions eliminated, and employees are *required to dance on camera* to build morale after rounds of layoffs and reduction in pay, company-wide. That's right- if you didn't get fired, your pay was decreased and all 401k contributions stopped to "help the company."

Pros

Great cause, noble industry, trying to make things better, inclusive culture

Cons

It seems all the companies efforts and resources were put into the Cengage Unlimited bucket and they cut corners other places leaving huge people deficits. Sales people are having to be technical support and training managers. Not enough support for sales or for product. Everyone is stretched super thin and are burning out fast. The company is having to hire more newbies, which doesn't put them in a good strategic position and places additional stress on the senior employees. They say they want to hear your thoughts and opinions but nothing ever changes. Hence the mass exodus in the past 6 months.

Pros

It's a place where I can be proud of my work. I love what I do, I love my team, and my managers have been outstanding. The company leadership cares about us workers as human beings, as well as the customers.

Cons

Like any other company, layoffs happen due to market forces. It's not the end of the world, but still, it's sad when it happens to friends.