Talented team and cool products, but startup pressures exist - Anonymous employee ValStream Employee Review

As another review aptly put: There are no positives at Valstream.

Before going into the red flags, which are so plentiful at this company that one could write an entire novel, allow me to explain my review headline. At the time of writing, there are 9 reviews for this company. 6 of said 9 reviews were posted in the span of just 10 days in April 2026. So, that clearly indicates something significant happened recently to bring this many employees to glassdoor to post how they feel about this company (bear in mind this is a startup or "scaleup" should I say with only 70ish people). However, if you look at just the dates of these 6 reviews, you'll quickly realise 3 of the reviews are fake positive reviews to counter the 3 real negative reviews that came before them. Look at the dates of the three 5 star reviews posted just before this review, they're all 30 April 2026. What are the odds that three 5 star reviews are posted on the exact same day, just after three 1 star reviews posted a couple of days earlier? Just look at the reviews themselves if you aren't convinced by their timing. They read like generic corporate slop from leadership just giving themselves a pat on the back by posting how good the product and the people are. I say this with such confidence because when you're someone who's worked in such a small company for this long, it's easy to tell who's who. If you still aren't convinced, just look at the job titles of the reviewers, they're either as generic as possible or it's the classic "Anonymous Employee". Firstly, I didn't even know we had any administrators at the company! Unless it's a cover for the HR department which makes sense given how they're defending the company in the cons section of their review by saying it's not the company's fault for having 2 rounds of redundancies in just 3 months! Secondly, the review from someone who's apparently in the engineer department is particularly funny to read since the person didn't bother clarifying what type of engineer they are. Anyone who works here can tell you we have software, data and QA engineers. No one is known as just an "engineer". Regardless, their pros section reads like generic corporate slop that doesn't actually tell you anything about working here. I mean, how cringey is it to describe a company as "dynamic". What does that even mean?? Not even going to bother with the fake review by the classic anonymous employee, but the obvious tell that this is a review from a leadership shill is the fact that they describe the product as "damn cool". Here's some advice to the so called leaders in the leadership team; if you're going to post fake 5 star reviews, at least make them as if they were written by real human beings who work here! I could go on, but I think you get the picture. The reason I wanted to point this out is so that no one who does their homework before even considering this company falls into the same trap as I and my fellow colleagues did. Look at the real reviews and you'll realise you need to avoid this company for the sake of your mental health. - 4 days in office, would be 5 days in office if leadership wasn't scared of everyone leaving. And mind you, this is the worst office I've worked in my entire career. Sometimes there wouldn't even be enough desks for people so you'd have to share a desk. Don't you just love leaving your comfortable home office to commute an hour to the office where you work on half a desk that you have to share since there's too many people for the tiny office that the company refuses to change despite constant complaints? Me too! - I cannot understate the levels of micromanagement at this company. It seems that the worse the business does commercially, leadership think it's because employees aren't working hard enough, so decide to become even stricter in micromanaging. You're not even allowed to sit away from your manager it's that bad. - You know it's bad when a well known employee in the office screams "F this company" in front of the whole office and then rage quits. Add that to the 2 rounds of redundancies in just 3 months, as well as multiple senior new joiners also rage quitting in like 2 weeks after joining because of the ridiculous office requirements. Need I say more? Conclusively, this company is not worth your time or effort. They treat people like numbers on a payroll ready to be deleted at the press of a button the moment the cost base, as leadership keep talking about, becomes too high. A couple of colleagues I spoke to said they joined ValStream due to unemployment or simply not being able to find a good job. So, unless you're absolutely desperate to put food on the table, avoid this company like the plague otherwise you'll regret it every single unfortunate day you have to work in this purgatory.

I believe the main pro of this company is the absolutely wonderful People. Honestly, some of the best people I have ever worked with. They really made you look forward to coming to work.

Unfortunately, there are many cons, which are expressed in vivid detail in previous reviews. However, the one that sums it all up is out-of-touch leadership.