Downward Spiral - Complete disdain for employees - Anonymous employee StubHub Employee Review

First, StubHub is not really a technology company. It is a business run on a website that is highly effective at maximizing profits from the inefficiencies in the ticketing industry. There is minimal investment in new technology and there is no appreciation for tech-minded employees - only for producing as much ROI for as little cost. In general we don’t spend and create an environment to attract and retain the best tech talent, and recent senior hires were done via friends and without vetting internally (so they are far from being top talent). The tech exec team do not understand technology nor do they care to learn more about it, and its role in driving the company forward or in potentially new directions. Any investment in tech is completely misplaced, or done via third party platforms/consultant agencies that don’t truly understand the business model or its intricate workings. It’s surprising that our corporate parent doesn’t hold us more accountable for these poor investments as they never deliver any results. Secondly, The company has been on a downward trajectory for last few years (multiple rounds of layoffs in each org of the company), which has been accelerated and exacerbated with recent management changes including new-ish CEO and several execs in Product and Tech org. This new regime has destroyed any culture or sense of identity/self-worth/pride of working at StubHub, and their ignorance has contributed to a lack of empathy and value of people that I (and many others) have never seen before. Anybody who is outspoken about a difference of opinion is quickly called out as a ‘problem’ and sidelined, laid off, or pushed into a position encouraging them to leave. There is no room/tolerance for open discussion - it’s ‘my way or the highway’. Politics are now critical, and ‘who you know’ and ‘who likes you’ are more important to your success/career than any work or results you could ever produce. Unsurprisingly, with this new political culture there are less things getting done with less success and less engagement, and more attention paid to managing relationships and perceptions (I.e. don’t let yourself be singled out for the next round of layoffs!). The Product and Tech group is managed by fear, submission and enforcement - instead of an healthy/normal open and collaborative nature. Additionally, these new managers, routinely and publicly demonstrate their incompetence, and lack necessary experience in their functional areas - yet are never held responsible. This is combined with massive arrogance about how things should be done, and with purposeful exclusion of outside counsel or advice, leading to a huge attrition rate and the complete destruction of what was once a healthy culture and working environment. A recent reorganization in the product and tech group for product/UX/program managers had many people placed into new roles that they were not a good fit for, and without any prior input or discussion with those individuals. Some people were informed of their new roles in a public offsite meeting and from a slide in a presentation!! Imagine learning from a presentation in front of your peers that you have a new job in which you have no skill set, interest or background in after working at a company for years! The mindset is that all employees are fungible. Peoples’ skills, aspirations, and experience have no meaning anymore. Individuals’ names are not even important - they are just pieces of a puzzle to be moved around on an org chart for the appearance of change. Talk about a complete lack of integrity, common-sense, managerial skills, and empathy for your employees. You would think HR would address this gross misconduct, but they only protect the company and by extension the misbehaving executive team. Thirdly, while most of the above is about the Product and Tech org, the company is extremely siloed to a detrimental effect. Each org (CS, Marketing, Business Ops, etc) runs independently and without regard or even engagement with the other leaders. There is obviously corporate politics at that level but it’s almost as if each org leader works solely to have their peers fail to gain more power or favor with the CEO, instead of doing what’s right for our business, customers or employees. Recently, the entire P&T org has suffered greatly as a result from lack of a strong politician/technologist at its helm. It’s sad and demonstrates a complete failure of the leadership team - in particular the CEO - for the misalignment and difficulty in working cross-functionally inside the company.