Zero conception of work/life balance - Anonymous employee Handshake Employee Review

2.0
Oct 29, 2020
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Fast-growing, if that appeals to you. If you want to work super hard you’ll get a lot of “props” and “shout outs” and “woot woot”s from the team. Last I checked you can’t pay the rent with a shout-out though.

Cons

As others have said, there is no work/life balance here. “Unlimited” PTO comes with blackout periods where time off isn’t allowed (roughly four-five months of the year). When people do take vacation days, the expectation is that you’ll check email once a day and respond to “emergencies”, and provide a cell phone number where you can be reached. Working weekends and late nights is the norm. During the interview process, they’ll sell you on their grand vision of equalizing opportunities for students from underprivileged backgrounds. Maybe once upon a time that was true, but these days you can practically see the dollar signs in the CEO’s eyes. There is no mission apart from making money. Internal communication is pretty bad but that’s par for the course with growing startups so you can’t hold it against them.

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5.0
Jun 12, 2026
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Pros

Work at your own pace.

Cons

Task limit when new to project.

2.0
Jun 12, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

It's flexible and sometimes the money is OK. I got paid most of what they owed me.

Cons

Generally disorganized. The task I was on was one of the more highly paid ones but it was almost impossible to actually do in the allotted time. You aren't supposed to use AI but I think people must. The tasks run far over the time they are supposed to take. The human review system also seemed almost arbitrary. Reviewers did not have the subject matter expertise they claimed to. You will make less than the advertised hourly rate because the tasks routinely take longer than they say they will. If they have averages that are lower, those people are either not submitting accurate hours (there is incentive not to) or are using AI to train AI, which is a bigger problem (but not yours).

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