Frame.io Reviews

**Terrible CEO** - As other reviews have highlighted, the number one problem at Frame is the CEO. He deserves credit for his intuition of the video production industry and for bringing an impactful product to market. But he is way out of his depth running a mid-sized, Series C technology startup. He exudes an absolute disdain for process and the minutiae of running a technology company. He regularly undermines product and sales strategies with ad hoc directives and "spot teams" isolated from the rest of the company. More than anything, he seems driven by the image of being a successful CEO. It seems as if he is surrounded by "yes men" who cater to his wishes and then fires those in the C-level that don't. He has served as de facto Chief Product Officer since firing the last one in late 2018, and uses this role to micromanage the work of the design and engineering teams. Managers and directors in the Product org seem to spend a lot of time defending their teams from intrusion by the CEO's misguided leadership. Some do this well, others struggle and simply pass the stress of the CEO's varying demands onto the ICs themselves. He lacks a commanding authority, since so many employees at the company are jaded by his toxic behavior and struggle to trust him further. He loves to talk about how he means well, and he probably truly does, but things are so difficult it really does not matter. **Beware Of Burnout** - The company glamorizes a culture of overwork. People who work long hours are applauded in public forums, setting a precedent of what is expected. Deadlines are often unnecessarily tight, leading people to work these long hours to deliver in time. This has all gotten worse in 2020 with the move to permanent remote work due to the pandemic. The company has done little to encourage employee wellness in the face of an unprecedented public health crisis, instead asking people to hustle even harder. The issue of burnout has been repeatedly raised in company all hands in the latter half of 2020. Each time, leadership pushes the burden back onto the individual with such missives as "we have unlimited vacation so please use it". However, in turn, many people are discouraged both directly and indirectly of using such benefits to prevent burnout. One executive said in a September all hands, verbatim, "now is not the time to take vacation", in reference to the remainder of the 2020 calendar year. Good luck surviving more than 2 years at this company—very very few do! **Faltering Product Strategy** - The company has reached an inflection point: it is no longer the upstart entrant with a novel product. Instead, it is established with a mature SaaS offering. The company seems to be struggling to develop a strategy for its next stage. The CEO and executive leadership have some fantastic pitches for the next big bets, but those ideas are not being translated into a cohesive project timeline. Current projects feel overly ambitious and indefinite in scope (i.e. no end in sight). In addition, teams on the product organization are understaffed and severely isolated from one another. Certain teams that should be working together instead compete for resources. Everything feels like a mess that somehow manages to get along. It has always been this way, but it's becoming less tenable as the company grows in size. This is the one con where real progress could be made. The company has hired many solid leaders in the product org that can make real change here. Simply hiring even more will help address the lack of staffing.

They struggle to attract/retain good leadership. Senior leaders tread a fine line of pandering to the CEO (or else being forced out of the company) without losing the respect of all their reports. Multiple design, engineering and product directors/VPs have taken similar paths in and out of the company. The CEO micromanages the departments close to his heart (frontend engineering, design, product), and basically ignores the rest. Founders did not develop a positive culture early on, meaning the company culture is weak (and kind of weird); Scattered at best, problematic at worst. It is not a very diverse workplace, and there is no genuine intention of becoming more diverse. There was occasional lip service about “increasing diversity”, followed by no concrete action. Leadership, particularly the CEO, glorifies workaholicism. Work-life balance is not valued at the company. Very few people leave the company in good standing. The narrative around departures is tightly controlled by leadership, and issues/problems/mistakes are generally blamed on those who left. The lack of open communication and tightly controlled narratives mean gossip is the currency of the office. Take most of the reviews on this platform with a grain of salt - Frame.io likes to curate them as much as possible, by stacking their own deck as well as encouraging new employees to leave glowing reviews.