Product Designer - Product Designer Olark Employee Review

Teammates are inclusive, and for a tech company of this size, there is relatively little sexism on the team. I've never worked in a place where 4 of 6 directors are female, and as a younger woman, that's cool to see. Also really good benefits - The remote flexibility is great, also things like 3 month parental leave, big professional development budgets, annual retreat & unlimited vacations, internal promotions...Seems like there's opportunities to develop new skills or join other teams too ( member of the Triage team recently started training as a backend engineer and a CS member joined Product).

There's a lot of pressure to give feedback, probably more than in an in-person company. Everyone gets 360s evals twice a year, and there's a survey each quarter about what kinds of OKRs we want to try, and team retros too. It's an adjustment and I think it would be hard if you aren't comfortable with giving/receiving feedback on a regular basis.

This is, by far, the most friendly and empathetic work environment I've been a part of. It's also remote-friendly and is actually successful at being remote. I had jobs in the past that claimed to be remote-friendly but it felt like I was on an island. Olark is very different. We use a lot of communication tools to stay connected, there are weekly team meetings that the entire company attends, and there are frequent check ins to ensure we're on track, happy and healthy. There is a strong, sincere focus on well-being. Olark lets you live your life. There is also a strong culture of customer support. We want our customers to love working with us, and we truly aim to focus on their best interests and feedback to make business decisions. I've worked at some great companies, but Olark ranks at the top. They are doing it right.

If you aren't used to working remote, check out the book "Remote." It's a great, fast read and can help with the transition. I listed this under "con" but it's really a pro. It's just an adjustment. Once you've made it and it's working for you/your life, you won't want to go back to in-house work.