BubblyPanda
BubblyPanda

Help me identifying toxic culture

I work at a Bangalore-based startup, and I need help understanding whether this practice is considered a good norm.

  1. Initially, the Founder/CTO asked employees to work on Saturdays only for urgent tasks. This evolved into alternate-week Saturday sessions for 2-4 hours of planning. Eventually, it turned into a weekly mandate to work on Saturdays.
  2. The CEO instructed employees not to take leaves unless there’s an emergency or sickness, applicable until the end of the year.
  3. The CTO emphasized collaboration, urging developers, QA, and designers to work together on solutions. For example, developers are expected to start working on development tasks even before designs are finalized.
  4. Designers often find their proposed solutions dismissed by the CTO, who provides alternative suggestions. While some of these are helpful, others are unconventional and difficult to implement.
  5. Product understanding and feedback are gathered solely through product feedback channels, which are cluttered with numerous daily messages. There’s no direct interaction with customers.
  6. Employees who work long hours (11-12 hours daily) receive praise, creating an environment where working late is glorified.
  7. There is immense work pressure with no structured processes. Tasks are frequently marked as urgent, and if deadlines are missed, employees are told they have failed.
  8. When these concerns were raised with HR, they dismissed the emphasis on working long hours, stating that "working late doesn’t matter" and that employees should focus on doing "smart work.”
22d ago
22Kviews
Find out if you are being paid fairly.Download Grapevine
BubblyUnicorn
BubblyUnicorn

I was in that type of company, I have applied for leave for my anniversary (applied before 2 months) and then they asked me to come to office on that day! I had wfh that day and all my plans with my wife had to postpone due to work! (shit work nothing serious). After two months they laid me off and fortunately I got a good job at a very good startup at a founding team!

I have been working with cofounders and honestly cofounder can make tell you that these all are not good traits of a good cofounder. Our cofounder personally appreciates mf if I deliver something to our users on weekends. And we never discuss anything that we have done on holidays or weekends! Bro it’s time to move

BubblyPanda
BubblyPanda

These people are asking everyone to push works to Sunday, so that work doesn’t get affected. Not only that, they asked designers to be on call with each other atleast for 5 hours a day. They also fired 2 devs and didn’t rehire saying the team is enough to compensate. CTO said its not like they don’t have money, but they don’t want to hire

BubblyUnicorn
BubblyUnicorn

How large is your company and in what stage (seed, pre-seed, A etc)?

CosmicNarwhal
CosmicNarwhal

Most startups have a toxic culture, thing is you smartly work on stuff that enhances your resume and then switch to better company.

TwirlyJellybean
TwirlyJellybean

I think IT industry in general has toxicity, doesn't matter if its a startup or MNC. You just have to get lucky to get into a non-toxic environment

JazzyMuffin
JazzyMuffin

are you talking about newme haha?

JazzyWalrus
JazzyWalrus

Why newme?

JazzyWalrus
JazzyWalrus

Name and shame. This startup is trying way too hard to raise the next funding round. That’s why they are riding you and are personally involved in day to day. The scene is bad. Go work for a competitor instead.

WobblyUnicorn
WobblyUnicorn

Please take the name of the company and save rest of the people

BubblyPanda
BubblyPanda

Really want to but still working:))

BouncyMarshmallow
BouncyMarshmallow

Basically you are screwing up your personal life to ensure that CEO and CTO become rich 🤑

BubblyPanda
BubblyPanda

They said something similar to us. CTO said that they don’t wanna spend life like mediocre people because of our mistake. They spent much time on the product and want to succeed

Discover more
Curated from across
Indian Startups

Is this toxic work culture or I am overthinking

For context: Weekends are off. So just fri WFH. This is a Series B startup. I am not even asking for a leave but WFH for just 1 day. I joined recently. The only thing I did wrong was possibly informing a little too late.

Want to get o...

Post image
31K
Top comment
user

Not a great culture, also you don’t have to give the actual reason, instead say due to some unavoidable work or famil...

Software Engineers

Rant on Swiggy wlb

Work culture has become ultra toxic. Managers have started nano managing and literally are a pain in the ass. Product giving unrealistic timelines and leadership agreeing on the same without even consulting the developers and even if the...

Top comment
user

This is all trickling down from the Leadership, they are trying to cut down costs by any means. Already had one round...

Product Managers

Toxic culture <> micromanagement

I recently joined a organisation 3 months back as an APM and I am not liking the culture of the company. From growth perspective the company is good but some things that disturb the mental stability. The micromanagement of the company. S...