Terrible management — not worth your mental health. - Graphic Designer CT Employee Review

2.0
Aug 25, 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Great clients, great projects, fully remote.

Cons

The variety of clients and projects is the only real positive — you do learn a lot from that exposure. Beyond that, the company feels inhuman. They use tracking software that takes photos and screenshots every 10 minutes, and your KPIs depend on those images (too dark or not looking at the screen = negative points). Goals are constantly adjusted to be unachievable, and excellent work is not enough; what they really value is constant chatting and “visibility” in group conversations. Direct managers in design seem to care more about seeing you socialize, comment, and “be present” in chats than about the quality of your work. Even when owners told me my work was excellent, it still wasn’t enough — the expectation was that I should constantly engage in group conversations. To me, it felt out of place to be criticized for not being talkative when I consistently delivered on time, met deadlines, and had no issues with clients. Feedback is not welcomed either. After honestly answering a company survey, I was personally contacted by an owner just to prove me wrong instead of listening. That confirmed how little they value employee voices. The overall environment is impersonal — even profile photos are replaced by generic cartoons, erasing diversity and individuality. In the end, it’s clear they don’t want creative professionals, they want machines.

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CT Response
10mo
I am sorry to hear about your experience, as it reads like a "real" one (compared to others). I'd love to get more context on some of your concerns- 1. Being made to "chat" in the design teams? While we do put a big emphasis on communications, it would be unusual for a team lead to weight chatting over any of your objective work effort and output. I'd love more context there. 2. We talk a lot about Time Doctor in reviews here - when you clock in we expect you to be paying attention to the work you're doing. You don't receive "negative points" but if your team lead feels concerned that you're not focused and are still billing clients time, they'll flag that with you. 3. We haven't changed KPIs for the design team in quite some time- I believe 5 years. So the idea that goals are unachievable or a moving target is problematic and misrepresents something, or there is some area where we can improve our communication. I'd love to hear more there. Thanks in advance for your response!

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Cons

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Cons

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