Supportive team facing frequent reorgs and disconnected leadership - Software Engineer Grindr Employee Review

Team culture, talent density, tech stack, brand recognition, benefits, offices

Tuesdays and Thursdays in the office [con if you prefer WFH, I find it helpful]

It pays very well and the benefits are best-in-class.

Leadership wants to sand every edge off a queer app until it's bland enough to sell to advertisers and reassure Wall Street. Grindr publicly wants the app to become a "Global Gayborhood in Your Pocket," ... but the result is an enshittified, barely functioning app that's anything but the sharp, sex-positive, specifically queer product it was at its inception. The straightwashing is the part I can't get past. Several teams have become a creeping majority of straight people making creative and strategic decisions about an app they have never once opened. I don't know how you greenlight campaigns for a community you've never been part of, but they manage it, and it shows in every flat, focus-grouped piece of work that goes out the door. The audience can tell. The audience can always tell. It's insanity. The people steering the brand simply don't care about the people using it, and you cannot fake the thing that's missing. What's worse is that even leadership who *are* part of the community lack the taste to have any modicum of grip on the LGBTQ+ zeitgeist. They think they do, and our audience laughs at us. As they should. The app and ancillary content coming out of it are laughable. Any person with moderately competent critical thinking skills could be able to understand why this is an issue. You're having people who have never used the app, who aren't gay themselves, acting as arbiters for what an audience wants and gets to receive. No wonder our why our audience hates us—the decision makers are either straight, out of touch, or both.