As others have mentioned, turnover is high here because the writing is on the wall that Extend likely isn't going anywhere but down. Senior leadership doesn't have their act together and have some serious maturation and growing up to do. After being told more than once that the company is stable and in a good place, they quietly began layoffs and hoped no one would notice. Many of the people let go have been with the company less than a year.
Likewise, MANY of the people who've been jumping ship of their own accord were with the company less than a year. It became obvious that something was wrong when entire teams were quitting out of nowhere and leadership was waving away the growing concerns with, "Eh, don't worry about it, we're just growing to a company size where turnover is normal now."
Nothing about what's happening at Extend is normal. Morale is conspicuously low because leadership simply doesn't seem at all enthusiastic about the company's future. No one seems to have a concrete grasp of where Extend is headed or even what the company's focus is anymore. Conversations surrounding branding, messaging, and identity were too constant for a company that claims to be on solid footing and a clear path forward.
Extend lured a lot of talented people in less than a year ago with shiny promises of equity grants, and those people either rapidly started losing faith and jumping ship or got screwed over after they chose to stay and try and right the ship.
Compensation was laughable here. No 401k match and salaries that were insultingly low, particularly for people living in areas with high costs of living. I was made a well-below market rate offer when I was hired, but took it because the role I was being offered was substantially better than the one I was in at the time. And again, that alluring promise of equity in the future was supposed to make the offer feel a little less insulting. I had red flags during the interview process that I should've heeded rather than explain away in my head.
Despite making it seem as though market-rate salaries were too much to ask from leadership, they certainly didn't mind spending money on ridiculous, unnecessary expenses, like SKO at one of the priciest, most exclusive five-star resorts they could find followed by another offsite, preceded by many offsites that they apparently realized too late were for companies with champagne budgets, not just champagne tastes.
Internal resources/technologies are slim and what they do have is outdated and archaic. Internal communication is awful, particularly if you're in a role that requires a lot of cross-functional collaboration. Good luck getting hold of salespeople that don't reply to email or Slack messages faster than a couple of weeks later. Some team leads make it clear they have no interest in doing anything beyond the most basic requirements of their job and don't expect anything more from their ICs, either. People that were ambitious, hard working, and had big ideas that could take Extend far were stunted from the start by bureaucracy and leadership's overly cautious (and frankly, boring and uncreative) views on how Extend should talk about and market itself.
Some older employees who'd been with the company since the beginning or close to it were reluctant to work with the waves of newcomers (and reluctant to relinquish control), which created unnecessary tension and friction. While one of Extend's few pros was in the overall positive demeanor of most the people I worked with, some of them did a poor job of hiding that they felt threatened and jealous of some of the new teammates they had to work with.
I've worked at a number of dull companies, but I can't remember the last time I felt as uninspired by my work as I did working here. Between red tape that acted antithetically to a startup environment and an overall feeling of working for a company deeply unsure of itself and its identity, Extend isn't worth taking a chance on and, given how they treat their employees, not a company I'd recommend working for.
