Toxic CEO - Software Development Manager White Cup Employee Review

1.0
26 Oct 2022
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

A lot of good people doing their best in a tough situation Almost everyone in the company is friendly and down to earth Cheap benefits Unlimited PTO

Cons

Products are old and not enough resources have been put into them to keep them up to date. A lot of customers are leaving. Matt Mullen, the CEO, is an extremely toxic person. In my 25+ year career, he is the worst human being I've ever worked with. He always thinks he's the smartest person in the room and is very condescending to everyone. I've witnessed him talking down to people in the all-hands meetings, leadership meetings, everywhere. The only mentoring he does is to tell you that you're wrong. Sometimes he's really nice, until he's not. You never know if it's going to be "happy Matt" or "bully Matt". I've heard a few people describe him as a narcissist. White Cup is basically a marketing company that happens to sell software. Matt is only concerned with producing the least amount of quality possible to ship something out the door fast. Then he complains that installing and supporting it is too difficult. He has admitted in all-hands meetings that after the company posts something on LinkedIn, he will check it in a few days to see who has liked and shared it. Nothing like being stalked on social media by your employer. How does he motivate people to work better? By threatening to fire the whole team. "Act like your jobs are on the line, because they are." Not exactly a great way to get the best work out of developers. You'd think that being a small company, it would be like a "work family". Nope. We're all still replaceable cogs in the machine, with Matt always asking the question "do we have the right people?" instead of "how can we support and our people?". The only thing that really bonds us together is our mutual and collective fear of the CEO. In the first 1.5 years that Matt has been here: * He fired 2 CTOs. For 1 of those, he lied and told the company they quit. He does not plan on filling that position again. * 3 Chief Product Managers quit * Director of Professional Services quit * Numerous individual contributors quit because of him * 2 rounds of layoffs And it doesn't stop with just the people in the company. Matt even told me that the "marketing type" person on the Board was an idiot, and that he put someone he knows on the Board to “have some intelligence on the board”.

Explore other reviews about White Cup

5.0
22 Sept 2023
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

White Cup has wonderful, thoughtful, strategic leadership team- who support a good work life balance. The company is well positioned strategically to be successful in the market. Matt, our CEO, is a great communicator and supportive leader. He cares a lot about the success of the team and isn't afraid to get into the details when needed.

Cons

White Cup is undergoing changes needed to grow. Change is sometimes difficult.

2.0
6 May 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Work- life balance, pay, benefits, great co-workers who are always willing to help

Cons

The company does not care about their existing customer base, they have lost many many customers over the last few years. They only care about bringing in new business, which is not a sustainable business model. The CRO who has limited involvement with the sales team, actually lets the sales ops person manage the team who is a great person but has never sold anything in the past. The CRO’s way of motivating is criticizing everything people do wrong and threatening jobs; which in turn has the whole sales team demotivated and losing confidence in themselves. The CRO doesn’t want to roll up his sleeves and help in deals or develop reps; but rather just show up at the end of a deal and shake hands with a company’s leader and negotiate. There are many problems at this company but leadership puts all the blame on sales.

See reviews by: Helpful|Rating|Date|All