MathWorks reviews

4.3

88% would recommend to a friend

(2,563 total reviews)
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Jack Little

94% approve of CEO

86% positive business outlook

MathWorks has an employee rating of 4.3 out of 5 stars, based on 2,563 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have an excellent working experience there. The MathWorks employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Informationstechnologie industry (3.9 stars).

Reviews by job title

3K reviews
4.0
Mar 1, 2013
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- MathWorks is a very successful company. Despite being very conservative from a management standpoint, it is still able to rake in boatloads of cash. That cash is then reinvested strategically in the business (facilities, new hires). - If you have initiative, you are encouraged to carve out your niche, by working on side projects that you're interested in. Only 1 of my 3 objectives has anything to do with what I was originally hired for. - Open door policy: the culture encourages people to collaborate and get involved in others' projects. Information is freely dispersed throughout the whole company. This is such a refreshing change from working for public companies and the government. - The work/life balance is great, at least in my group. - Perks: Free breakfast, drinks, cookies. Anniversary celebrations, winter celebration, summer outing, Sales Kickoff. Facilities are great. Nearly all employees get offices. - Solid benefits: Health insurance, 401k match, group discounts.

Cons

- The review process is largely a waste of time. Your rating is decided (by consensus of the managers in your group) before your manager even starts writing your review. You are asked to write a self review, but your manager isn't even allowed to read it until your rating has been decided and your review has been written. Since peer quotes are non-anonymous, they are mostly just employees scratching each other's backs without any honest feedback. - Senior management can be out of touch with what customers really want. Product decisions are made based on what is the "next big thing" or what Jack thinks sounds cool, without any customer demand backing it up. Yeah, MATLAB Mobile is a great idea - too bad you can't actually do anything useful with it. These projects are then pushed out at the expense of other projects (things that customers actually want) that have been languishing for years. - Cliques have formed of people who have been at MW for decades. They are quick to close ranks whenever they feel threatened by newcomers. - The previous two bullets, plus the fact that MATLAB doesn't have significant competition, mean that there are few consequences for failure. There are no "feature deadlines" at MW. If a true competitor emerged, MW would struggle to compete with this mindset.

3.0
Jan 27, 2013
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

+you get an office +free breakfast on Wednesday and cookies on Friday +half the time it is a rational culture making the right decisions +bonuses are paid quarterly

Cons

-Your pay will never align to outside professionals doing the same job or less, regardless of what HR tells you -the review process is over engineered (like much of MWs') and your direct manager will be evaluated on how critical he/she is of you. If you don't impale yourself with "I can do better sword" your manager will do it for you. -raises beyond 2-3% are non existent, but be prepared for .5-1% if you are new and not getting the MW's culture. Promotions are like sightings of Big Foot? Has there ever been a sighting of Big Foot in Massachusetts? -From above, the other half of the time you will be in meetings, about the previous meeting, where we discussed the other meetings and the cross collaboration that we needed to gather more information. Welcome to MW's cross collaboration model of controlled cultural ciaos. Don't stray from this model, but if you do get prepared for your first lecture on MW's unique culture from your manager. I stopped asking questions a couple of years ago and life is MW's good.

2.0
May 13, 2011
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Interesting problems, smart people to work with, Core values are largely practiced well, pretty good compensation and benefits, company has good reputation for your next job, decent bonus structure, lots of food and drink

Cons

The company is losing its way and not valuing employees by pushing out experienced staff to lower costs, development processes are archaic, decision making is slow but not for the consensus-building reasons they say, no equity, when the core values aren't followed they're mutilated, no respect for the skills you have other than maybe what they think they hired you for, opaque review process that is sometimes used abusively for political purposes, key decisions are only made by trusted old-timers and if you're not one you can end your career quickly by attempting improvements, remote work policy is absurd

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