Toxic and awful - Anonymous employee The Riveter Employee Review

- Company does not live its mission - Toxic C-suite - Terrible treatment of employees From the outside, The Riveter looks like it is doing great things for women in the workplace. But inside it is a toxic workplace with a culture of distrust, fear of retribution, and excessive burnout. When I worked at The Riveter, the C-Suite was toxic and communication was top-down and tone deaf. Women of Color, and especially Black women, were tokenized. New initiatives that impacted employees and members in the coworking spaces were consistently half-baked when rolled out, creating enormous amounts of stress, chaos, and confusion. Across the company employees were talked down to, shamed, and patronized, while workload was constantly increased, and resources like support staff and budgets were reduced. Employees were yelled at by C-suites and there was a fear of losing your job daily. The company put unrealistically high expectations on its staff, while providing minimal resources, expecting long hours, and constantly moving the goal post. Benefits included unlimited PTO, but work-life balance was not possible as you were expected to be on call and available at all hours, all days. The founder wants to be a celebrity and talks a great game! But her ego and desire to be a hero to women is the poison in the well. It is absolute hypocrisy that she makes one of her platforms equal pay for women/ paying women what they’re worth. Pay was not commensurate with the responsibilities and mental and emotional load. Most employees worked an average of 12 - 14 hour days and many were trying to support their families on just over the living wage *for a single person*. Further, staff in the spaces were continually asked by leadership to bring in women to do speaking and programming - with the preference being to ask Women of Color - but told that there was no budget to pay them. Trades for space in exchange for work were not an option either. In no uncertain terms, they expected women to contribute their time, knowledge, and expertise with no compensation. There is so much more that can be said, but it comes down to this: The Riveter is a farce and hands down the most toxic company I have ever worked for. Leadership actively created the exact workplace it is supposed to be fighting. Neither the company nor the founder deserve the praise that’s been constant since launching, and The Riveter has never deserved all of the brilliant people who have come through its doors expecting a workplace where they would be respected and valued.