STAY AWAY FROM THIS COMPANY - Learn from my mistake
Pros
I would be lying to you if I said there was anything positive about Smart72.
Cons
Where to begin... During the early stages of my interview process I was told I was going to be building out and developing the renewable energy division for Smart 72's new headquarters in the Bay Area. Originally, I was told I would be selling solar photo-voltaic systems, service upgrades, and EV chargers to the East and South Bay. I was told I would be able to make over $100,000 with this position. Early on, I was manipulated by "being a team player" to help out our HVAC team with a couple of sales. This lead me to what I would come to find would be my ACTUAL position. In reality, my position turned into something much different. On any given day, I would be driving around a service territory from Sacramento all the way to Monterey, CA to attempt to sell overpriced air conditioning to customers. I was provided with absolutely no formalized training to sell air conditioning. I originally told myself that this was because the company was too busy to train me, but I would later come to realize Smart 72 prefers the "push you out of the nest two weeks into the job method" and will "learn as you attempt to sell to customers". Although, I am someone who understands failure as a learning mechanism, Smart 72's methodology proved to be wildly unsuccessful. I would later learn that this method was also applied to their installers/technicians. I became very close with most of these technicians and they too agreed that little to no training was provided to them before being allowed to go work on these extremely complicated electrical systems. This leads me to my next point- that is one of the biggest internal problems within Smart 72. Because of the dysfunctional organization of this company, everyone is mostly looking out for themselves. I believe this to be a top down effect from management. Because they are scrambling to keep their sinking ship afloat, their ability to create a positive work environment is essentially non-existent. Employees are left to look after themselves and it shows in your every day interactions. The few competent employees that capable of helping, are usually tied up and over worked for close to 11 hours per day, and do not have time to assist in the minor details that help a company thrive. To sum it all up most employees are in a pretty terrible mood most of the time, especially in the San Luis Obispo office (which I actually spent a fair amount of time in). DO NOT let their attempt of creating a cool/hip office fool you. Employee turnover is quick in this company and no one stays there for long. Before Smart 72, I was successfully selling solar in Seattle for close to 3 years. I thought this jump into whole-home energy automation would be a wonderful jump for my career. Boy was I wrong. I'm almost embarrassed at times that I fell into a job like this. This was by far, THE WORST JOB/COMPANY I HAVE EVER HAD THE DISPLEASURE OF WORKING FOR. STAY AWAY FROM SMART 72... you deserve better in your life. Oh and by the way... I have over $400 in expenses that were never reimbursed to me from Smart 72. After 3 months of run-around, Jason the CEO, told me to contact my lawyer, if I want that money back. Stand up guy...
