“We want to be a high performing organisation” - Engineer Xero Employee Review

1.0
19 Mar 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Worked with really smart and capable engineers Interesting technical problems

Cons

Execs think because some worked for the likes of Google, they know everything Sukhinder once said during company wide meeting that being a CEO is hard and if anyone would like to swap places with her, they’re welcome to. Sure, it must also be very hard to take home USD15,000,000 as a rem package whilst others barely get a 2% pay rise during high inflation. Increasing customers monthly subscriptions and getting rid of people via a sham performance review process that’s constantly changing every couple of months. Your time will be busy making sure you’re ticking the right boxes rather than doing actual work that would make a difference and impact not only to the company but to customers. Could barely write code and release due to politics and what should be a a day or twos work can turned into weeks and months of documentation to justify why x is going to take x long. Because no one trust anyone to do their job and micromanaging is rife building their own fiefdom. As an engineer, be prepared to wear many hats, from BA, PO, delivery, testing, documentations and all administration that coding would be like 15% and the rest is dealing with management politics. If you want to progress with your career, then learn to stroke the right ego and become a yes sir and ma’am because if you think hard work and capabilities will get you there, you’re dreaming. There is lacking leadership at most levels. The key thing here is how to get share price up so the execs can get their bonuses and go. Combining CPO and CTO, well… just look at the incident page and see how the system is going. But hey, they used to work for Google. Thanks to the sham performance reviews, the only way to survive is to stab each others back because every year, you’ll be competing with your colleagues to keep your job as someone will always get the boot. I no longer volunteer as tribute.

Explore other reviews about Xero

5.0
24 Apr 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Great culture and solid benefits

Cons

Could be a bit chaotic at times

3.0
1 May 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The team is super smart and everyone knows their stuff well. If you see an opportunity, you can take it and do it. Flat structure, less authority means you can experiment and do as much as you want.

Cons

There's not much of an onboarding, so you have to figure things out. It can feel very sink or swim. Also, you have to work across many different time zones as well, because the team is global. Also, people have very short fuses if you don't pick things up quickly or not as smart as them.

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