Dysfunctional Organisation - Project Manager Appen Employee Review

1.0
30 May 2021
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Good office culture (which has probably been smashed by recent redundancies), friendly co-workers (again smashed by recent redundancies), and interesting projects (even if everyone is overworked).

Cons

After a series of mismanagement decisions by the executive and senior management, stemming from a long held dysfunctional relationship between senior management, corporate functions and operations functions, a further series of bad decisions have been made in the recent redundancy and headcount reductions. There has always been a dysfunctional relationship between the "three Appens" - the operations team, committed to excellence but overworked with limited resources; the corporate functions and sales teams who blatantly don't listen to the consultation from operations and sell either infeasible projects and programs or sell them for unacceptably low margins under the guise that the opportunities are "strategic"; and the executive and senior management who clearly are so far removed from the details of the work operations does. This dysfunction is never clearer than the decisions made in the reduction of staff. The senior management have made several invaluable, brilliant staff, with specialised knowledge redundant, purely based on location/finance (and not performance), save a few "golden children" nepotistic-ally chosen by senior management. This compounds the current overwork of operations, and it feels all of our client projects are suffering/reeling from this (showing how far off the senior management really are from the reality of how to run this business). Additionally, sales and corporate functions have continued how they always have, continuing to sell things with little understanding/comprehension of the feasibility of projects and an unwillingness/inability to listen. For those that have not been made redundant, many wish they had (we were all over-worked before the redundancies), and almost all I've spoken too are looking for employment elsewhere. Appen has repeatedly broken the trust of its employees and there is little keeping what remaining talent the business has.

Explore other reviews about Appen

5.0
2 Dec 2025
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The work tasks are relatively clear, and my colleagues are very friendly and always offer help when I don't understand something. The company's policies and culture are also very transparent.

Cons

Sometimes due to urgent work delivery timelines.

1
5.0
28 Sept 2017
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Working at home on the computer.

Cons

Lack of proper communication. No phone communication whatsoever, only by sending in tickets and emails. They hired me for a project for me to review advertisements and I worked hard at this task and always looked back at the materials as a guideline to keep all my answers as per how they want them to be. However, this was not good enough for them and I was retested. Of course, I knew they would fail the retest and fire me immediately. In addition, I have been putting in my house on my time sheet and they have not paid me once. They claim I will be paid for the hours I billed for but I have not seen any money yet. I am giving up on seeing any pay and my working with Appen has been a total waste of my time when I could have been putting in my efforts working for someone else.

166
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Appen Response
8y
We’re very sorry to hear about your negative experience with Appen! Please feel free to contact us at feedback@appen.com; we would love to hear more information about your situation in hopes that it will help us improve our processes. - HR Manager
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