Sub-par leadership squander big potential - Anonymous employee Metromile Employee Review

5.0
Apr 18, 2020
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Friendly and laid back culture, fun people, good work-life balance

Cons

Leadership is comically sub-par, particularly CEO and CFO. Decision making is not grounded in reality and company reverses course every quarter. Numbers are simply made out of thin air and there is lack of alignment on key objectives. Product team has first among equals status, but is held least accountable. Attitude around product improvement and UX is lackadaisical, and product is so buggy that it is the single biggest hindrance to growth (embarrassing for a company which claims to be a tech company first). A significant investment was made over the last year to revamp the Marketing, Comms and Sales functions (new CMO, VP/Director level hires) who went about assembling a high-class team and reversing some of the legacy practices. Just as things were beginning to trend upwards, the leadership decided to change course and lay off the entire function. This is baffling fir a company who’s product-market fit couldn’t be any better during the Corona-virus crisis which is when the layoffs occurred. Some of the recent hires (0-3 months into the tenure) left good careers who were left in limbo without even getting a chance to prove their mettle. If the financial situation was so dire, why not pause hiring first. This is a total failure of leadership at an ethical level.

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5.0
Jun 20, 2024
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Pros

Very good culture. Loved the transparency

Cons

Did not listen to customer feedback. Auto insurance is a tough gig.

5.0
Oct 15, 2014
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

We’ve got a great ~40 person team with really smart people that are also super fun to hang out with. Weekly happy hours, weekly beer o’clock during company demos, board game nights, karaoke, musical jam sessions, catered lunch 2x a week (sometimes 3 with in-house tech talks), are always expanding and growing, Product Managers who make it easy for you to do what you are good at, 2 week sprints / release cycles, subsidized Muni/Bart etc passes, $50/mo on gym & equipment, an amazing CEO who will also be your best bud but still someone you super respect, user-centered, and of course, car lovers. The compensation is market-rate and fair, with equity. Very flexible schedules so you don't have to worry about going to an appointment in the middle of the day or going home early for your kid's baseball game. People generally come in between 8-10 and leave between 5-7, and have a specific passion that they are working on here. Upper management cares about how you want to progress in your career, and give you plenty of opportunities to grow and learn. Very supportive team with a general sense of camaraderie, as evidenced by frequent nerf gun battles.

Cons

We're still a small startup, so there are some growing pains like small office (working on moving soon), and having to figure out best practices, processes, and work flows for your field through some trial and error, instead of having them already in place. However, it's still extremely rewarding and you have a lot of ownership in building company culture and processes for your specific field. In my 2+ year experience, the company has been pretty fast at iterating on working out kinks of being a small startup.

10
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