A recruiter reached out to me about a tech manager job at Cengage. I don't know anyone who works there but based on the Glassdoor reviews it seems like a great place. 4+ star rating, CEO winning awards, good benefits, and so on. As I did more research though I found that the financials seemed to be a mess with a prior bankruptcy a decade ago, a stock that isn't worth owning. a declining credit rating, and quarterly investor reports that focus more on the number of net new subscribers without mentioning how those new subscribers helped increase revenue or profits. As I kept digging I found TheLayoff and the difference in opinions compared to Glassdoor was night and day. Of particular concern were all of the posts about cuts to staff and comp. I know answers on here will likely be biased but could someone give some information on this crazy split?
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@jaoc+18o3LKGk You are correct. The problem is Cengage leadership refuses to listen to their customers, whether it be students or professors.
Former Cengage Sales - Cengage does have great people, however, there is no job security and you could get let go for doing absolutely nothing wrong. Managers are very intimidated by their team members and lots of micromanaging that goes on. Own most all cases Cengage can’t get out of its own way to continue growing the company. CEngage Unlimited is not the answer as higher ed is facing a decline in enrollment due to the lower birth rates we will be facing with students of age.
If you have no job and need a job for money - take it. If you have a job and are just shopping - not leave what you have. This isn’t the one to jump for!
@jguy+18o3LKGk I think the key here too is that the issue is entirely with Cengage, not the students. If CU was helping people to learn and charging a fair amount then most students would be fine with signing up. As it stands the product is garbage and the only reason people buy it is that they have no choice. If colleges decided tomorrow to allow the option of using alternative material, say Youtube videos or free publications, then the number of new subscriptions to CU would drop like a rock and students would be better for it. All that to say to the OP if you haven't turned the job down yet and don't mind working for a company whose business model involves taking advantage of those trying to better themselves, both the employees and the customers, then go for it.
@ijms+18o3LKGk At the end of the day this is why I left Cengage and the industry. Once I realized that I spent years of my career working to improve products that our customers hated and would always hate, it s—ed the life out of me. And there is no getting around that fact despite the insistence of our former Chief product officer about “delighting the student.” What a complete joke. Sometimes I wondered if our clown show management ever stopped to listen to the words that came out of their mouths.
Cengage is not a publisher. It is a cutting edge technology company Defining the EdTech space. Think of Cengage as being like Netflix for textbooks.
Imagine working for a company whose end user finds no value in the product they are forced to purchase.
Funny to see downvotes on people sharing their negative experiences with the company. One other detail I would add is that Cengage tries to market itself as a benevolent entity helping provide higher education to anyone but really they're nothing more than a publisher. When's the last time you heard anyone say nice things about the textbook publishers? Students hate it, professors hate it, and neither side needs it anymore. As yengage also engages in shady behavior to make the numbers seem positive when business is a wreck.
Completely irrelevant. What people say about Microsoft has nothing to do with your decision unless you also received an offer from them. Look for themes in what you see about Cengage.
My advice is to search comments other companies on The Layoff receive and see how they compare in terms of negativity (Microsoft, for example.) That way you’ll have a better idea of how much of this is coming from disgruntled former employees, how much reflects what is happening in every industry, and how much is specifically a Cengage problem.
A job with Cengage is guaranteed to end with one of the following events.
- You are fired because a manager feels threatened.
- You are downsized because your job is off-shored.
- You are let go because of cost-cutting.
But the worst fate is what many are currently enduring. They work in dead end jobs, at a dead end company and dont have the network or courage to quit. They spend years in an unfulfilling career, working with other miserable people doing the same thing.
RUN. FAR. AWAY.
DO NOT throw your career away there. They will use you, underpay you, and throw you away when a manager who knows less than you feels threatened by your existence.
Cengage IT is a mess. Years ago at 25 there was a legit IT manager who left. They replaced him with an Englishman who used to walk around making lists of people working from home on Friday when we had Summer hours.
Since the IT manager couldn’t have summer hours He took it upon himself to present this list to Hansen and ended the summer hour program for everyone. Keep in mind, many people commute to get into the office and giving up an hour Monday - Thursday to get a couple off on Friday was a nice perk.
Since that guy IT managers have been a revolving door.
It's most important to reject modernity and embrace soup if you desire a career at the cengage soup kitchen and baguette bakery
You should know that last year Cengage was headed toward a merger with McGraw-Hill. The CEO said there would be no layoffs leading up to the merger. In November last year Cengage suddenly went into massive layoffs because the company was literally running out of money. The merger was later called off. That is the kind of leadership you can expect.
When I briefly worked at the Raleigh office my last boss there used to always act like they had tons of experience as they talked down to the team. A quick search on LinkedIn showed that their only job besides Cengage was one year at some lousy small non-tech company and they had no previous experience leading teams or doing most of the work my team was supposed to do. Another director there used to brag about how the product space they were in had tens of millions in assets even though the number had dropped by more than half over the past few years and was still falling. The tech stack was an absolute mess. Both the dev and QA side had no idea what they were doing and so the job was largely dealing with these awful patchworks of code that followed little standards and brittle tests where no one even knew what the test did. When I left the office seemed to be surviving on a combo of the longtime staff who will never leave and a revolving door of college grads who would only stay long enough to realize the bait and switch before moving on to something else. Raleigh had too good a market for those with talent to put up with Cengage.
Do not consider any offer from Cenage! As an ex-enterprise architect I can assure you that all systems in all divisions are a big ball of mud. The skill sets of their IT staff is extremely weak. Their systems are very badly designed and terribly imp!emented. Why? Cengage IT management are IT-know-nothings. Their 'road maps' are over flowing with use cases devoid of key performance indicators. A clueless ameture hour. Their IT projects (which are only upgrades) routinely have 200+ cost over-runs due to gross negligence. Leadership has zero background in IT, literally paid zero IT dues. Their is absolutely nothing about their systems that is 'revolutionary'! Terrible c-ap! Don't step in it.
Site cut me off. Anyways. Likewise there's an overreliance on college grads for filling Dev/QA roles because why work for Cengage over the various great tech companies in the area. But those CoE managers still act as though Cengage is the greatest. It's like that guy who was the starting QB in high school still bragging about the big game even though he's now 40 and obese.
@5nbb+18o3LKGk The OP mentioned further down that it was in Raleigh. Cengage's illustrious Center of Excellence. Most of those CoE managers have been in the same tired roles for years because the good companies in Raleigh won't bother hiring an out of touch manager of a crumbling publisher with a cobbled tech stack over more qualified candidates. Likewise there's an overreliance on college grads for filling Dev/QA roles because w
Where was the position located?
I guess my advice would be stay out of educational publishing. That being said, don't even consider joining an Educational Technology company.
@2hki+18o3LKGk Your response to what you classified as a "hatchet job" comment is to say that "all publishing companies are laying people off in droves." Yeah, I think that just about sums it up.
If you have a good job now...STAY THE F— AWAY FROM CENGAGE
Ignore the hatchet job comment. Not everyone only gets a 1% raise. And all businesses operate for profit. Layoffs are part and parcel of the publishing industry, however, as you will see if you check other such companies on The Layoff.
You should also know that the company is run by private equity with a longtime private equity wall street player currently serving as COO. This has ruined the culture and created a management culture where employees are treated as disposable commodities per the private equity ownership model. There's a lot of flowery language from management but that's all a cover. The company regularly has layoffs every year and won't think twice about cutting your job if it can fatten their dividend payment by a dollar. They really are that ruthless. Expect bottom a bottom of the barrel salary for your profession and laughable 1% merit increases that don't come close to keeping up with inflation. The company has paid out exactly one bonus since I've been here. Bottom line is the company treats its employees like pieces of garbage. If you work in tech they might entice you with a good starting salary since they struggle to attract tech workers, but that will be your salary for the remainder of your time at Cengage.
@1wkg+18o3LKGk Good to know. I wondered about the long-tern viability of the industry since students and professors don't exactly love the publishers and publishing in general has been moving online which can't be good for business.
Cengage itself is a decent place to work, but the industry itself is in turmoil and all publishers are struggling. Cengage has the added problem of significant debt due to its sale years ago to a private equity. As a result reorganizations and layoffs are common (as they will be at any publishing company.) The pay cut and 401 match (both now restored) that someone mentioned here was due to the pandemic and should not be included as a factor. Such cuts happened in many companies in many industries. On the positive side, the 401 match was restored sooner than was initially proposed.
@1fae+18o3LKGk Thanks as well. If it helps any the role would have been in the Raleigh site. Supposedly the Center of Excellence as the recruiter kept calling it. Pay wasn't bad but the recruiter was quiet on benefits and the person who would have been my boss gave me the vibe that they'd be rough to work under. They also sidestepped a lot of my questions about things like finances and layoffs.
@1qkb+18o3LKGk Thanks for the response. I always knew Glassdoor could be gamed to some extent and figured there was some scheme like the BBB where you can pay for a better score but that's pretty shady.
I think it’s a troll post but I’ll bite.
Used to be a great place to work but it’s pretty much a dead industry. 20% pay cuts and no company 401k match for a while this year and a failed merger with MGH.
If you really need a job there are worse people to work with. Most of the staff are decent people. Lots of reorganization and layoffs.
Original poster here. My question is legitimate and not intended to stir anything. I have a very good job currently so to even consider leaving for another company means I do some serious homework. I read nearly every Glassdoor review posted in the past couple of years and read through the investor reports for the past couple of years. I've seen companies spike their Glassdoor reviews before so I know that can't be fully trusted but it seems odd that hardly anyone posts a negative review on Glassdoor yet here and on other sites responses are so negative and contradictory to what Glassdoor says.
The company basically manages their reviews. HR and PR employees post half of the 5 star reviews and the other half are posted by sycophantic employees who are strongly encouraged to share their review. Negative 1 star reviews don’t last longer than a day or two. The current CEO ranted at a townhall meeting years ago about discovering negative reviews on glassdoor to the point where he met with the company’s CEO. Within a few months the company’s reviews magically turned around and the CEO (who is despised by most of the company’s employees) was named a “top 50 CEO” or whatever which is a joke when considering how poorly he’s managed the company. Stay far away.
Can’t help but wondering if this is a disingenuous post considering the specific details mentioned. Soup guy: is that you stirring the pot again?