Pros
Get to set your own hrs and essentially work from anywhere with an internet
Cons
I understand growing pains are often inevitable with startups, but their styling software, ANNA, and the client management system which they called "Dashboard" are inefficient and often broken. E.g. To find the specific pieces that clients have requested, you'd often have to scroll through 10+ pages of clothing because ANNA lacks many basic filtering options; this is fine if we had more time, but we are encouraged to keep the time we spend with every client/Lookbook (consisting of 36+ pieces) to 1.5 hrs. Now, onto the Dashboard, due to the 100% remote nature of this role, there’s a lot of distrust and hence micromanagement: they expect you to enter all the *exact times* you'd be following up with clients (even if it's a single text) into this Dashboard, which is not only often broken, but it's highly inefficient; e.g. I spent more time scheduling these "follow-ups" than actually following up (which often is just a single text). I've reflected to my manager that I'd like to track these in my own Google Calendar, but of course they're not okay with that. That's just 1 example. Now, those are all issues I feel like I could bear with; after all, there has to be a trade-off when you can set your own hrs and can work from anywhere, right? But let's move on to what I believe could ultimately break this company: you can mess up work processes and tools, but you can't mess up people. Because they are growing so fast and thus having to promote people here and there (these people often possess zero leadership experiences), you sometimes end up with very incompetent people as your managers. Most of them (I've been assigned to 3 different managers during my time there) just follow the rules without very little soft skills; my 1st and 2nd managers were pretty good at being transparent, etc. My 3rd? She tried, but she is clearly very confrontation-averse and have trouble being transparent/upfront with you. According to her, I was 1 of the best-performing stylists 1 second (even asking me if I'm interested in being promoted to an Assistant Styling Manager), and the next second? I was fired. Yes, she did talk to me once on the phone between those 2 events, but it was very much just, "Please let me know when you need help", etc. (I was juggling another job that involved a lot of traveling between those 2 events, and the time difference/last-minute flight changes resulted in 1 Lookbook being sent a few hrs late and 2 texts that were sent a day or 2 later, yet these were unresponsive clients who have not texted me back for weeks); there was literally no warning whatsoever (literally not even a reproachful tone in her voice). I was quite startled and confused. What I found to be especially frustrating is that out of the sea of Lookbooks created by other stylists we are able to see via ANNA, mine was 1 of the only few that consistently met and exceeded their quality: I always had 12 pieces in each Look, both sides of a pair of shoes in each Lookbook, and minimized negative space (literally more than half of the Lookbooks I was coming across did not meet these standards, yet most of them are still at Allume). Most crucially, I actually had prior styling experience and am someone whose style is complimented frequently by other urban fashionistas (I travel to NYC twice a month)… The tastes and experiences of some of these “stylists” (many have no styling experience and literally would put together a “Look” consisting of a plain t-shirt with some Plain-Jane jeans) are sort of demeaning to people like us. Finally, aside from those 3 delays, I always went above and beyond to help our clients out, and this was evident in my text correspondence with them. Yet apparently none of these matter, and without a warning, I was fired. My last complaint is their lack of culture (and perhaps a major factor that they feel so comfortable in treating others like this)… Your manager will communicate with you via email 90% of the time. Aside from training, I literally only spoke to my managers 3 times (via webcam or phone) my entire time there. Don’t expect there to any kind of community, and therefore, don’t expect a support system of any type. Your manager can essentially dictate your survival in this company because you can’t really bond with anyone else (hell, you can’t even bond with your own manager). One time they messed up my *paycheck*, and I reached out to 1 of the finance associates in management, and she didn’t address my problem until almost 1 month, multiple emails, and complaints to my manager later. That should be telling for you.