TL;DR Culture used to have cool things, enabling experimentation and professional growth. Now all the leaders have changed, and there is a more top-down approach. This allows less space for ideas and growth and makes Typeform a less appealing company to work for. Still good, but going downhill in some critical aspects.
Since its start, Typeform had always suffered from a lack of good senior leadership. The model was far from perfect and caused unnecessary friction, pain, and many inefficiencies. Yet these leaders gave enough space for people to work free and grow. IMO they got a solid foundation; they encouraged people to do great work and results followed. Unfortunately, that is not enough for a company at the scale of Typeform.
With its rapid growth, problems became bigger and bigger. No alignment between departments and an unclear working in direction led to political games. There weren't clear expectations from and for many roles neither a clear understanding of how promotions worked. Add to this a death start project (i.e., builder v2) and the results were way below expected. Another unpleasant effect was an increase in attrition. It was clear that Typeform needed changes.
Last year those changes started to happen. First, the CTO got replaced. Then the co-CEOs(original founders) and after them COO(now CEO), CPO and CFO. Of course, this caused many changes in heads of departments as well. Now the last change is a new CTO. Yes two CTO changes in less than a year. The last one without an interview process and with by far the weakest background.
All these changes have changed Typeform quite a lot. Some of the changes are good and long waited for. Like more data-informed decision taking or more practical approach to product design. But others are counterproductive.
Now decisions are more top-down. Many people don't feel safe or encouraged enough to challenge upper management with concerns and alternatives. The main reason for this is because leaders are not listening to people and imposing their ideas. This undermines and underutilises people value and will cause even more significant employee turnover.
For example, many people in engineering are worried about many of the changes the CTO is proposing. Their biggest fears are on their impact in collaboration and global team performance. They also have concerns about the adverse effects on quality. He already comes with solutions. Doesn't ask for context and is not open to alternatives neither challenges to his ideas. The worst is that most of his answers are against modern engineering practices.
Very far from what many of us thought was Typeform's potential.
