Going Down - werkgeversreview Anonieme werknemer bij Contrast Security

Exciting Vision & Renewed Focus: The company has undergone significant changes, but the new leadership is steering us in the right direction. The focus on IAST and ADR as key solutions is a game-changer for application security. Transparency & Culture Shift: Management has made a real effort to be more transparent and bring back the startup energy that made this company great in the first place. Passionate & Talented Team: Despite the challenges, the passion among employees is returning. The people who remain are dedicated, talented, and genuinely want to see the company succeed. Opportunities for Impact: With a more focused product direction, employees have a real chance to shape the future of appsec and work on cutting-edge security solutions.

Layoff Aftermath: The layoffs were tough on morale, and the company is still recovering. Some employees are struggling with the rapid changes. Execution Needs to Catch Up to Vision: While the vision is exciting, there’s still work to be done in executing it effectively and ensuring everyone is aligned. Shifting Priorities: With a history of trying multiple products across SAST, IAST, Serverless, and SCA, some employees are feeling uncertain about the long-term roadmap and what success looks like.

You will get to work under CEO Rick Fitz. Once in a lifetime experience. Not enough space to list the CEO's achievements, but we can try. - Having spent considerable time in the wilderness of unemployment, got himself a job as CEO of a once promising but stagnating appsec company. Despite having no appsec experience and no prior CEO experience. Very impressive political / connection skills! - Using the same skills, he filled the C-suite with his buddies from his previous company. Not a single one of them with any appsec experience! It is a wonderful country club they have got going. - Did not waste any time trying to get an understanding of the deteriorating culture of the company, how the employees were feeling, none of that. - Following previous tradition, did yet another repackaging of the same old tired, failing product. Tried to market it internally and externally as some groundbreaking work of innovation. Brilliant logic that if we reband the product one more time, something will finally stick. - When the above failed as expected, the price was paid by productive and capable employees in the form of losing their jobs. None of the executives got touched, of course. - Took the blame culture to another level. After every setback (e..g losing a major customer), the knives came out in full force. No introspection, no analysis. Just toxic blame and firings. - Took a faltering business and just drove it into the ground, by every possible metric - revenue, customer churn, attrition, layoffs, morale. - Drove a proper culture of fear into the company. Almost everyone is perpetually in fear of their job, afraid of being blamed, trying to stay relevant, lest they get stabbed. You will find more politics here than Washington, DC. - Ah, those lavish off-site retreats! The CEO definitely takes good care of his inner circle. If you happen to be in that privileged group, expect regular all expenses paid vacations on the company time. When you lay off so many people, a lot of money gets saved. What better way to utilize those savings? And at the same time you will get to exhort the rank of file to "do more with less". Put relentless pressure on them to deliver for you. Burn them out. They quit you and you save even more money to go on those retreats. It is a win-win. - Any other CEO would have been let go within 6-8 months, maximum a year. And yet here is our CEO. Three years plus. This is what you call high caliber political and survival skills. It's inspiring.

Nothing really. All aboard the Contrast train! Well, it has gone off the rails and is lying on its side but you can still get in. If you have the right skills to leverage connections and know how to market yourself to higher ups, you can go far here.