Pros
- The leadership and people at May legitimately care about each other - Especially the leadership at May Mobility truly seems to believe in the mission, vision, and values of the company - The technology that May is developing isn't being designed to create robotaxis for the rich, or some fun novelty for people in the industry, but, instead, a true transportation solution for people of all demographics - Even pre-COVID, work was flexible: the company offers terrific benefits for family leave, flexible work-from-home schedules, daily core hours between 10am and 4pm and freedom to self-determine one's own work schedule, and other ways in which to tailor work schedule to your life - Individual managers work - in my experience - incredibly hard to emphasize mental and emotional health and work-life balance. This isn't something that I can say with certainty for all people, but in my experience with my team and my managers this has been a plus. May offers unlimited Paid Time Off, and while of course this can be challenging to take advantage of in a fast-paced startup environment, I've never gotten the sense that taking vacation was faux-pas or frowned-upon, and I take every effort to encourage my team to take time whenever they can and need it. - The people are incredible. I've never worked with a team of people so committed to their cause and with the skills and competencies to back it up. - The work is fun! Not all days are good, but the results are legitimately cool and satisfying.
Cons
- Leadership has been nebulous, at best, and in upheaval at worst. Consistently the biggest concern of mine personally and that of many of my colleagues has been the direction set by leadership, concerns which have not been allayed by turnover at the CXX level. - Strategy and structure have been a consistent struggle at May. This is probably not uncommon amongst small startups; it's challenging sometimes to understand who is responsible for what, and how the company is going to move ahead. - As much as work-life balance is emphasized, it IS a startup, and it DOES sometime demand weird and wild hours, sometimes. - It can be frustrating at times to see the limitations of the technology, and understand how the odds are stacked for a company without the resources of some of the other huge names to compete in the space. This isn't anyone's fault, it's just a reality of the hand May has been dealt. Resources are scarce, startups are risky, and most new companies don't succeed.