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      Kraken

      Engaged Employer

      Kraken reviews

      Good people but hasn't learned to operate as a business - Lead Software Engineer Kraken Employee Review

      2.0
      Jul 3, 2025
      Lead software engineer
      Recommend
      CEO approval
      Business Outlook

      Pros

      Lots of kind and supportive people, business goals have positive impact. Opportunities to have an impact, though this requires swimming upstream (see cons) against the current prevailing culture

      Cons

      Kraken did well as a start up but has not yet figured out how to operate as a midsize company. This is leading to stressed and frustrated employees, mounting tech debt that is a serious outage waiting to happen, and upper management that is entirely disconnected from the reality of the business. - Everything is last minute and an "emergency", almost always due issues that could have easily been foreseen if people had the time, understanding, and support to actually plan - Team leads are forced to juggle what are three separate full time jobs: manager, engineering lead, and product manager. If you point this out you will be told that it's "part of the culture" - Pushing back against "emergency" demands doesn't go over well, but you'll also be questioned on why you aren't completing the assigned goals that get constantly dropped to cope with sudden incoming requests. No one in management seems to think this is a problem - Several people in mid to upper management are there because of length of time at the company rather than competency or maturity - No one knows how to get promoted. There are no templates, processes, or attempts at fairness - Multiple people complain about burnout, frustration, feeling under-appreciated and confused, but none of this is taken seriously or treated with understanding - Any feedback to higher-ups is shrugged off with responses like "just talk to your manager" (despite managers also not having any answers), telling you that you are "empowered" to fix the systemic and far-reaching organisational breakdowns, or being told that "chaos is part of the culture". If you ask Person A they'll tell you to ask Person B, and then Person B will tell you you should be speaking to Person A Ah, and as I found out firsthand, if you are audacious enough to resign in good standing, you'll suddenly be treated like an enemy for your remaining notice period.

      avatar
      Kraken Response
      11mo
      Hi there, Thanks for taking the time to leave a review and share your experience. It’s great to hear that you found the team kind and supportive, and that you felt able to have a meaningful impact through your work. That’s something we really value at Kraken. We know that growing quickly brings challenges, and feedback like yours helps us keep improving. While we don’t always get it right, we are continually developing the way we support our managers and teams - whether that’s through clearer guidance, better tooling, or more structured leadership support. We also understand that maintaining balance across delivery, planning and people leadership can be tough, and we’re working to make this more manageable where we can. On progression and planning, we’ve been building out more structure to bring greater clarity and consistency, though we know this can sometimes take time to land across all teams. We also take feedback seriously, and we want to make sure everyone has the right spaces to raise concerns - whether that’s through managers, community groups, or direct conversations with leaders. We’re sorry to hear your exit experience didn’t feel positive - that’s never our intention, and something we’ll reflect on. If you’d be open to chatting further or sharing more, I’d really welcome the opportunity to hear from you. Thanks again, Olivia Roberts olivia.roberts@kraken.tech

      Explore other reviews about Kraken

      5.0
      Jan 23, 2026
      Software engineer
      Recommend
      CEO approval
      Business Outlook

      Pros

      I joined Kraken a few weeks ago and so far it has been a very nice company to work for. The journey from recruitment to onboarding has been smooth and well-organized. The ELT's strong focus on culture clearly trickles down, creating an environment where you are free to work effectively. I hope it remains that way

      Cons

      No cons to report so far.

      5.0
      Dec 12, 2025
      Senior software engineer
      Recommend
      CEO approval
      Business Outlook

      Pros

      Newhire here, extremely glad to have landed at Kraken. The company is genuinely driven by a desire to deliver the transition to a sustainable energy future. Does an amazing job of making employees genuinely empowered and accountable, in a blameless and humane setting, which gives people the authority to make themselves productive. Normally I'd consider that to be a Silicon Valley thing, but here at Kraken this has a bit of a British spin on it, being the company's history derives from the UK's Octopus Energy. The resulting mix slices through corporate politics with real talk and joviality. I just got out of one genuinely hilarious and inspirational optional all-hands which left others commenting "OMG It's my first week, does this happen every Friday???" In my department, clients (such as electrical utilities) love the way we're revolutionizing their businesses, including the way they treat their call center staff, humanizing them to become wide-ranging, informed and empowered problem solvers on behalf of their customers, instead of helpless automatons following scripts. Elsewhere, Kraken has tentacles in all kinds of sustainable tech, from sustainable generation, huge demand-flattening battery installations, domestic EV chargers, and smart meters. Business is booming, growth is spectacular, and huge markets still exist for the taking...

      Cons

      I'm a programmer. We have a big codebase. There is some tech debt. But show me a 2,000 person high growth company for which that isn't true. Everyone has a very sane attitude towards it. Not a biggie.

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