Spotify

I have been at Spotify for over 3 years now, and it's an excellent employer. I don't think we are comparable to Google or Facebook in terms of engineering competency, but we are one of the best employers in every other way.

• Great benefits
• Incredibly diverse (in many ways: terms of gender, ethnicity, languages, etc.)
• Passionate about audio
• Incentivizes learning (via conferences, internal trainings, embeds)
• Easy to move around, either team or role
• Plenty of colleagues with personality
• A handful of world-class engineers that are easy to talk to
• Daniel and C-level management are refreshingly transparent. Huge fan of Daniel, Gustav, Barry's personality and approach to business. Honored to work under them.
• Positive work environment
• Never afraid of change
• Truly autonomous; each team mostly operates as its own "business."
• We make decisions primarily based on our own insight/views, secondly what our customers are saying, and thirdly what our competitors are doing. Priorities are right.
• We are 100% working on the right thing. Everything proves toward it.
• Incredible after-works and summer/winter parties
• Huge emphasis on team over individual
• Great investments in technical infrastructure, i.e., Kubernetes/Kotlin/Swift
• Real work-life balance, in true Swedish fashion.

It can be slow to make decisions or ship. I'm not entirely convinced if this is just due to a sprint versus marathon mindset, but it is very intentional from management.

Astoundingly poor manager retention. I am seeing managers leave left, right, and center. It's unclear why this is the case, and this will affect your personal growth.

Constant state of change in terms of restructuring. Although you do get used to it, it will affect your individual goals potentially significantly.

Promotion culture is weak. It has good intentions, but fails to work time and time again. Two examples:

• The first is one person didn't get promoted because "they didn't ask for it." (and others don't because "they ask too much rather than doing.")
• The second example is I saw someone not get promoted because they did not show enough loyalty in their tribe.

This has nothing to do with our newly introduced promotion framework and plays a part in why we struggle to maintain senior talent.

To my surprise, the longer you've been at Spotify, the lower your salary has proven to be. New hires get offered significantly higher base salaries. I am not even sure if it is a good idea to just leave and come back six months later. Intentions are good, but in reality, this performs astoundingly with varying results. I am also unclear how this compares with other companies.

Increasingly political and process-driven, which doesn't suit individuals who want to stay as individuals. This makes us increasingly slower to execute.

HR seems to rule the business. No exceptions exist at Spotify. This seems to stem from Swedish business culture where there are no exceptions. Don't work harder; it is not valued. Work hard during your paid hours, and you'll be fine. You have to be a role higher than HR, such as a senior business leader, to be remotely considered an exception.