Interesting solutions undermined by leadership and culture issues - Presales Engineer DDN Employee Review

2.0
6 Jan 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The underlying technology is interesting to work with, and historically has been competitive in the market. From a technical perspective the solutions have real potential. However continued investment, innovation, and clear strategic direction will be essential to ensure they remain competitive in a fast-moving industry.

Cons

In my experience, the primary challenges sit with leadership and culture rather than the technology itself. Communication from senior leadership is often poor, particularly during periods of organisational change, which creates uncertainty, low trust, and disengagement. Decisions frequently feel top-down and insufficiently transparent, with limited opportunity for meaningful employee input. There are very limited opportunities for career development and progression within sales and pre-sales roles. Management have explicitly stated that pay rises are not offered within sales functions, which makes long-term growth and retention difficult. As a result, the role is not well suited to individuals early in their career who are looking for structured development, mentorship, or financial progression. Morale is negatively impacted by inconsistent communication, limited accountability at leadership level, and a lack of clear investment in employee wellbeing. Over time, this creates a demotivating environment despite the quality of the underlying technology. There are also operational challenges around lead generation and pipeline quality. In my experience, sales teams spend a disproportionate amount of time validating, cleaning, and closing opportunities that do not progress. This creates inefficiency, frustration, and wasted effort, and suggests misalignment and insufficient quality controls between business development and sales.

Explore other reviews about DDN

5.0
21 Oct 2025
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Great outlook and growing industry

Cons

None that I could think of

1.0
9 Jun 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

There WERE great people who worked there. But wow, they are dropping like flies. “Unlimited” PTO

Cons

Benefits are weak, pay is way below industry for engineers. Leadership is literally ripping out entire departments from the top down.A VP is fired, the new person starts, the new person fires the entire team and replaces it with their own people. A person will be let go and days later the replacement will start. It has impacted so many departments and isn’t stopping any time soon. I’ve already seen it happen in Product/engineering, Finance, HR, Recruiting and other outlying departments. Most people I’m aware of are actively looking because they know the goal is to basically rebuild the company with all new people. It’s chaotic, it’s toxic, RUN!

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