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Awesome place to work, if you're not a fan of perfect code

Front End Developer
Current Employee
Has worked at Booking.com for 2 years
May 13, 2017
Amsterdam, Netherlands
5.0
RecommendsPositive OutlookApproves of CEO
Pros

Everything is done with A/B tests. It's very easy to implement your feature without a fear that it will break something. However, it doesn't mean that if the metrics are negative, your change will be 100% rejected. That's what I love about working here; I've never heard, 'It's red, so forget about it.' If you can explain it, everyone is here to listen and help.

  • Really smart devs and designers, ready to help you.
  • Lots of learning. There's a dedicated learning center building; just choose any training and go for it.
  • Work/life balance. If you're often in the office after 6 p.m., your manager will ask if everything is okay.
  • Monitoring is really good. Every developer can roll out the code, revert any change you consider harmful, etc.
  • Tolerance for errors. It's okay to make a mistake; you won't be fired even if you break everything. Just be smart and learn from mistakes.
  • All devs, designers, and other tech people are business-aware. It's checked in interviews, and everyone knows why we're doing a feature or not.
  • Career opportunities. Clear instructions on how to level up and what to expect from each level.
  • Choose your next team. There's an internal job board, and you can see what's happening there before you switch.
  • The canteen is awesome. There are fresh juices and a lot of food every day, with takeaway meals if you prefer to eat at your desk.
  • Competitive salary and yearly bonuses if you overperform.
  • Visa for 5 years, relocation to Amsterdam, and legal, tax, and housing help.
Cons

The code is worse than you might expect. Imagine a 10-year mix of JavaScript and Perl, sometimes supported by designers with differently configured editors.

It has its own syntax, defeating the purpose of any smart code editor. 'We need to think more if we really need ES6... in 2017.' That's really what it is: no code style, no tests, no reviews, no working code quality tools, huge CSS full of !important.

Frequent rotations and structural team changes: if you ask somebody how it works, the response most likely will be: 'I don't know, I'm new here, let me check it for you.'

I don't know, everything else is perfect. If such code doesn't offend you, it's the best place to work.

Advice to Management

Keep it up. Everything is perfect.

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