Great team, toxic CEO - werkgeversreview Support Engineer bij Lynton

1,0
24 jul 2025
Aanbevelen
Goedkeuring directeur
Zakelijk vooruitzicht

Pluspunten

Former Employee - Technical Support, promoted to Engineering - 2+ Years (SyncSmart) • The team—before the cultural shift—was filled with smart, collaborative, and genuinely kind people. Working alongside them was the highlight of my time there. • The company encouraged autonomy and creative problem-solving. Engineers were trusted to make decisions and given room to experiment. • There were opportunities to wear multiple hats and gain experience across domains, especially in a fast-moving startup environment. • The product suite was built on a legacy system, but the user base was active, loyal, and vocal—providing constant feedback that helped guide improvements. • Flexible remote work policy and generally solid work-life balance (until things shifted).

Minpunten

• The company’s culture collapsed when the CEO shifted his attention from LyntonWeb to SyncSmart in 2025. What had been a collaborative, open environment quickly gave way to paranoia, control, and fear. (LyntonWeb saw 50% turnover during his “focused” leadership there as well.) • The person who had been leading the team with professionalism, courtesy, and skill was pushed to the sidelines over a series of weeks. • Honest questions were met with threats — including a demotion. I was ultimately terminated shortly after raising concerns. • I was the only person in the entire company to receive a raise this year. I was shocked to learn this, as the other two more senior engineers on the team had not gotten a raise at all in the previous year. • The "CEO"’s behavior was erratic, retaliatory, and damaging to morale. I do not believe this leadership style is sustainable or healthy. • Lack of psychological safety: speaking up about issues or trying to understand key decisions was seen as disloyalty. • Decisions were dictated from the top with no regard for expertise. Despite lacking any engineering background, the "CEO" decided to abandon a working, live TypeScript (Next.js) product as the backbone of the company's new products — against unanimous team advice— and replaced it with a Golang rebuild he intended to generate via AI and a contractor. No one on the team had Golang experience, including the "CEO" himself. The team was not given access to view any of the code being written, nor the ability to test anything on the new server. We were only given general API guidelines to adhere to for our code to access this server. • Employee surveillance tools were used under the guise of productivity software. Meetings and internal chats—including voice calls—were monitored and transcribed by AI. There was no clear consent or communication about how these transcripts were used.

Reactie van Lynton
8mo
Hi, "ceo" here. This person's review contains numerous false statements, misinformation, and mischaracterization that I cannot address all content in full. We are open to a conversation for anyone who has questions about any specific points in the review. This reviewer was hired as a junior resource out of a full-stack bootcamp. They also built and sold their own company, and seemed carry their own ideas of what a "ceo" should be -- which they imposed as expectations on my role. I was told I should "spend more time with my son" and "do more ceo things" as though I belonged in an ivory tower removed from day-to-day operations, at a time when the business was suffering from a lack of leadership after I returned from a sabbatical. This individual was unaware that I built the architecture and framework in which they performed their day to day work. It was my responsibility to bring changes to the organization, take it in a new direction, and shape its future. This person failed to serve as a contributing member of the team and instead engaged in passive aggressive behavior, obstructionism, and unhealthy (some might say "toxic") backchannel communication that threatened the success of the organization. This person was ultimately let go for multiple offenses including breach of contract divulging confidential information in a public forum, and disrupting our operations.

Ontdek andere reviews over Lynton

5,0
24 jun 2022
Aanbevelen
Goedkeuring directeur
Zakelijk vooruitzicht

Pluspunten

Established culture of growth, actual commitment to work life balance, individualized support based on background and circumstance, open communication all the way up the leadership ladder. Transparency about company performance and intentions. Check-ins about your professional goals and a willingness to try to move you into situations that facilitate your growth and goals.

Minpunten

For me, none yet, but I could see the time zone differences across the company and with clients cause some strain on others as normal working hours might be unconventional depending on where you live, or shift depending on who you work with.

2
2,0
23 feb 2026
Aanbevelen
Goedkeuring directeur
Zakelijk vooruitzicht

Pluspunten

Colleagues were skilled, capable, and genuinely supportive.

Minpunten

- Nonstop overpromising of deliverables with no realistic internal alignment. - External commitments made without regard for actual timelines or resources. - Execution teams forced to carry constant and unreasonable pressure. - Scope was never adjusted, leaving internal teams to meet impossible deadlines. -The disconnect caused needless stress and steadily eroded morale. - Stronger expectation control is essential for long term sustainability.

Reactie van Lynton
2mo
Thank you for your feedback. First, it is unclear whether you are an actual current or former employee based on the content of your review. Second, anyone involved in client delivery has authority over the scope. The characterization that client teams are under pressure to meet unrealistic scopes or deadlines is simply untrue. Third, the client delivery team is responsible for managing scope, timeline, and expectations. These aren't imposed from on high. After reading this feedback carefully, in detail, and in full, we question its validity in full.
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