Promising vison, but hamstrung by poor management - Software Engineer Verily Employee Review

Leadership continually fails at basic communication around company decisions, and does not in any way prioritize employees or culture. Despite claiming to be a startup, there are many management levels, and all of the politics, micromanaging, and throwaway promotion driven initiatives that come with them. There have been cost cutting layoffs in multiple orgs, and leadership refuses to give even broad information about the scope, further contributing to a fatalistic culture. This is outlook was also not helped by a round of VP promotions after the latest cuts. Equity is also a constant issue. Internal selling windows have no fixed schedule, the most recent window was cancelled after weeks of employees asking for an update. Even when windows open, they are always oversubscribed, allowing selling of only 30-50% of any shares. Despite a years long process to separate more fully from Google, a new equity plan was still not in place by the time the previous one expired. We have been working without a plan for the last 6 months, meaning that a significant portion of compensation is simply not being awarded.