Reviews van Guardsquare

A generational gap separates mostly recent-grad employees from a C-suite that shapes every aspect of how the company operates. Leadership is directive and patronizing, offering little room for independent growth outside of full alignment with executive vision. The culture of openness is surface-level. In practice, no one challenges leadership. For instance, the CEO's monthly all-hands meetings see questions as the exception, and a quiet fear to ask pervades those meetings. An engineer-first mindset bleeds into other departments, reducing sales to a call center and marketing to a website and blog factory. Turnover is high and retention poor. Raise requests are routinely met with replacement rather than reward. HR is largely administrative, career planning is nonexistent, and professional development rarely extends beyond the occasional presentation skills session.

Guardsquare is the kind of company where the CEO and management seem to spend valuable time gossiping about former employees instead of actually supporting and valuing their current employees. Ironically, you’ll probably be way more interesting once you’ve walked out the door. The company culture feels like a tense environment where speaking your mind feels like a crime. Have an opinion or dare to disagree? Congrats, you’ve earned yourself a spot on the “bully” roster. Communication here is confusing and often translates to: paying the legal minimum, overworking you, and giving you an endless list of pointless tasks and rigid rules that show you are not trusted. But don’t worry—it’s supposedly for your own good, so be sure to express your gratitude! (Not that anyone is buying it). There is a feeling that the company is on a quest to clone people who think, act, and breathe exactly like the CEO. If you're not on board with that, it is best to leave... or, more likely, they’ll help you with that. Micromanagement seems to be the norm, and honestly, it is one of the main reasons people bail. Despite the issue being repeatedly pointed out, the situation only seems to worsen. Management is well aware of the burnout problem but doesn’t seem to believe they have anything to do with it, even as their team visibly crumbles before their eyes. What the CEO and management fail to understand is that authority is not imposed; it is earned. If you are a good-hearted, transparent, respectful, and innovative professional who actually wants to be heard and make a difference, you might not fit in.