8 Jan 2024
Chalk.com Reviews
4.1
76% would recommend to a friend
William Zhou
100% approve of CEO
51% positive business outlook
Reviews by job title
5 reviews
4.0
6 Sept 2019
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook
Pros
Tight-knit like a family.
Cons
Needs some more direction and product vision - can be a topsy turvy environment.
4.0
18 Jun 2019
Great team + collaborative environment, connect with your users
Current employee, more than 1 year
Kitchener, ON
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook
Pros
- We’re all figuring it out together As a small company, there is a lot of room to learn and grow within Chalk -- it still has the startup vibe of “we’re all figuring this stuff out together” and processes are being put into place as we do that. As a developer, I really enjoy collaborating with the design team, other developers and the product manager to solve problems together. I know the context behind what I’m working on: why it’s important for teachers or the business, why it’s designed this way, and I’m also able to give my own feedback on those. We are getting better and better at making sure the right people are in the loop, and how one team’s activities might affect another’s. Each org does regular updates at town halls which is a great opportunity to ask questions but also lets me know what to look out for that might affect my work. - Managers that care for me Both my current and past managers have cared for me personally and challenged me to improve. They’ve encouraged “bringing your whole self to work” (the whole company has also read Radical Candor) and because they’ve taken the time to get to know me as a person as well as a web developer, I trust them. They listen to how I’m doing and where I want to go in my career. They take action to give me projects that I’m interested in or introduce me to opportunities or people so I can work on skills I want to improve on. Having a great manager on my side is one of my favourite things about working here. - Connection to the users & customers At Chalk, all members of the Customer Experience team (which includes developers) have a 4-hour live chat shift every week, to talk to users who are experiencing issues or want to share feedback. It’s a great way to regularly be in touch with what problems are constantly cropping up, or gain insight into what users are thinking, or just to work on troubleshooting and communication skills. Client calls and conversations are also shared with the team, giving us a chance to hear feedback and thoughts straight from their mouths, and not secondhand through another team member. I really value having this connection with our users and I think it enables us to make informed decisions and build a great product.
Cons
- Documentation & processes still WIP When I first came on, a lot of the engineering support tasks, random bits of customer information, or how certain data structures worked together were still in people’s heads or not written down anywhere that was easily accessible. Since then, we’ve gotten better at writing things down and organizing them in the wiki or the Google Drive, but there is still a lot of engineering-specific knowledge that needs better documentation. Or just better documentation in general. - Generalists > specialists Because we are a small team, all developers need to be full-stack, or have working knowledge of the full stack. This is great for people still open to exploring and learning new things, and it was certainly something I was excited when I first started. However, if you know what you love and want to focus on, it might be hard to specialize in just that one thing because of the current team size. Although as I mentioned, my managers have been great at giving me projects catered to my interest -- you can’t escape the fact that you still need to touch other parts of the tech stack. This also doesn’t apply to just the tech stack. Everyone on the Product / Customer Experience team is currently scheduled to be on live chat for 4 hours a week to help out our users. I personally love this medium for connecting and empathizing with users, but it’s also something you may not expect from a traditional developer position. - Old guard There is a core group of people who have worked here since the beginning or have known each other for years through school. As a newcomer, it can feel tough to break into that circle or speak up about changing practices that may have worked before with their smaller team. - Smaller team is quieter team When I first started, we had 30 people. Over the past 2 years, we had to lose people (financial costs that leadership has learned from since then), or people have left, and we're down to ~20. It's a lot quieter in the office and doesn't feel as lively and engaged as before. - Minor thing Also the office is way too cold, especially in the summertime - which has nothing to do with Chalk but the building itself. Bring a hoodie to work.
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