Dangling carrots and conflicting performance standards. - Inside Learning Consultant (Sales) Cengage Employee Review

2.0
19 Jul 2016
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Good people, many of whom are passionate about education and improving outcomes. Friendly and non-competitive sales environment. Flexible schedules and work-life balance. Improving digital offerings.

Cons

Attaining bonuses is difficult under ideal circumstances. Accurate reporting is a constant problem and the hard work of getting commitments to use products can be undermined by multiple sales channels that may or may not be credited to the rep. The best people in day to day effort and metrics can be threatened with negative performance reviews while still being handed threshold incentive checks. Make sure you find the base pay acceptable and do not assume there is any loyalty or investment in your success from senior management.

Explore other reviews about Cengage

5.0
28 Mar 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Total rewards, time off, great people and culture

Cons

Lots of changes and uncertainty at times

3.0
4 Jun 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Company has some interesting approaches to the market and in the past they seemed value employees. There are some good employees there and there was, in the past, visionary leadership, but the people with the vision and leadership skills left the company a few years ago.

Cons

The company actively de-values employees. They had a project they called "Project Horizon" where they told all employees they needed to cut costs, so the company was going to have multiple layoffs over 3-5 years - but nobody was allowed to know when, where, or why - - just one day large swaths of people would be gone. That hung over everyone's heads - for years, and is indicative of how Cengage values employees - it doesn't. Everything is about trying to secure new funding and prepare for an IPO, so they stopped investing significantly in the products about 3 years ago and that's about when they stopped acting like they cared about employee wellness as well.

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