Great people! - Software Engineer Boom Entertainment Employee Review

3.0
6 Feb 2022
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Great company culture -- even with Covid and WFH, teammates are active, supportive, and there are occasional digital get-togethers organized. They also have uncapped PTO!

Cons

- pay is below the industry standard in software development - benefits are OK but not great -- affordable without a family but, even then, nothing to write home about - executives are too far removed from the ground to have a sense of the problems plaguing parts of the team, which is understandable on one hand as they're working hard to raise funding to keep the ship afloat, but depressing on the other because it gives the appearance of having placed little value on engineers

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Boom Entertainment Response
4y
Appreciate you taking the time to share feedback, and wishing you the best of luck in your next role. We’re glad you enjoyed the company culture. We’ve taken a lot of pride in the amazing people we have been able to add to the team, and it’s not surprising (but it is encouraging!) to hear how supportive and collaborative that culture has become. On the critiques, thank you for sharing them. We’ll take them to heart, but we also wanted to share some info for your and other candidates’ consideration. On comp, we tell people that if you are just looking for the highest immediate cash comp, we’re not going to be able to out-spend the Googles/Facebooks of the world. However, we believe we are very competitive here in general and we believe that long-term, working at Boom can be the most rewarding choice you can make (for long-term career potential, learnings, great peer environment, etc.). We evaluated our current stats and while we don’t have perfect data (we don’t know or can’t ask salary numbers for people in their past jobs), we believe that for 90+% of employees, they are making more at Boom than they’ve ever made previously. And most of the people who don’t fall into that category are execs who have chosen to take lower pay for more equity upside. The hiring market is always evolving, and we try to evolve with it. As of today, of employees who have been with us at least 12 months, 96% have received a raise (some quite substantial). Of employees who have been with us least 18 months, that number improves to a full 100%. Some employees have gotten multiple raises in their first year when we discovered how talented they were. We strive to be a meritocracy where the best people and best work are rewarded. On benefits, we’ve made a lot of updates here in the past year (adding coverage, more benefits), but we take this feedback seriously and will continue to improve in this area. On the exec comment, we appreciate the feedback. We try to walk that delicate line of not micromanaging while also providing enough support for our team. It’s an imperfect science, but based on this and other feedback we’ve received recently, we are going to lean in more here. Also, we don’t want people to think we’re struggling to ‘keep the ship afloat’ :) (we have doubled or tripled revenue every year since our founding, and we have a very healthy and comfortable balance sheet with substantial cash in the business and a long runway). It is true though that our executive team does spend a lot of time externally-faced to secure additional growth (in the form of new partnerships, etc.), but we’ll make sure we are in the weeds as much as possible and more importantly we’ll make sure our team members and managers get enough support and leadership to thrive. Thanks again for the feedback and feel free to reach out anytime to discuss with us further. Steve

Explore other reviews about Boom Entertainment

5.0
5 Dec 2024
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

A great place to work

Cons

I didn't experience this much.

1.0
2 Feb 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Remote work, decent communication from leadership

Cons

No room for growth and so many layoffs at the worst times.

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Boom Entertainment Response
3mo
Well, we’d encourage people who are looking at this review to read the other reviews on this site. There have been plenty of valid critiques on the company over the years, but this is probably the only one that insinuates that the team members suck (i.e., calling them “garbage people”). Candidly, our team members are very, very good. All of them could work at a lot of places, but they choose to work at Boom for one reason or another (e.g., they like the autonomy, the industry, the direct impact they can have, etc.). No one is perfect, and every individual (myself very much included) has areas where they can grow, but I’d dispute this characterization of our team with every fiber of my soul. We have immensely talented people here who care a lot about the products they are working on, and the team members they are collaborating with. It also feels odd to see a review that gives a positive review of me, but disparages our team, compensation, and outlook. I believe I know who gave this review (if my assumption is correct, it was someone who we let go due to performance). I think we gave this individual a fair shake, but smart people can come to different conclusions. Even still, I am grateful for their efforts and contributions to the company. I respectfully disagree with this person’s opinion on our outlook (2026 is on pace to be our best year ever for revenue and users, and I’m very bullish about our trajectory). Additionally, I think we are very competitive on pay and we last had layoffs in our primary sports business back in 2024, almost two years ago. Like many VC-backed companies, we’ve had to shift from capital-fueled growth to revenue-fueled growth, and while that transition can be bumpy, we have managed it and are now in a strong financial position. Occasionally, it’s no longer the right fit for an individual and a company. I think that’s what happened here. We wish you all the best moving forward and are rooting for your success. Steve Murphy Boom Sports CEO
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