Pros
- Interesting work if you like sports gambling and/or finance
- Broad tech stack to learn from
- Great individual contributors
- Chances to travel to other offices around the world
Cons
Working for the Smarkets CEO is one of your best chances to experience what it would be like to work for Donald Trump except the Smarkets CEO doesn't have the ability to negotiate or sell anything. For example he offers employees who would like to work from home, the opportunity to work less hours and get paid less instead. He is the epitome of a narcissist, he has opinions about everything, but knowledge about none of it. The people inside the company who will defend him are classic bootlickers, and placate him at every turn.
The flat structure doesn't serve you, the common employee like you might think. It actually gives you less defense against the CEO's micromanagement, outbursts and outright bullying. All the managers leave after a year or two because the CEO is impossible to deal with.
Most employees I know at Smarkets make their top priority at work avoiding the CEO at all costs. And like another reviewer mentioned, you can only avoid him for so long before you are on his radar. At which point you get to engage in the CEOs favorite activity, public shaming.