Good place to grow, bad place to stay
Pros
If you're looking for a place to step outside of your comfort zone, wear multiple hats, and do things that you've never done, then this is the place for you. The pipeline of going from self published author, to book deal, to having your story turned into a live action short movie/vertical drama is really unique and not being done anywhere else. Steady revenue growth year over year generally. Most of the people there are fantastic to be around both personally and professionally.
Cons
While the pipeline and funnel for Inkitt is unique, the company will never reach its full potential with the existing leadership in place. Micromanagement by the CEO is really really difficult to deal with - there's no trust between employees and him. It feels like you're constantly trying to show him you can be trusted and he thinks you're working to tear down his company. No real long term vision other than "generate more revenue" - The "Disney of the 21st Century" is really just a catchy tag line to sell investors more than anything else. Romance novels are all the company has going for it and it hasn't provided a game plan on how to branch out beyond that. Toxic individuals are praised rather than pushed out - As long as you're getting things done, nothing matters. You can be as toxic and mean as you need to be as long as you're hitting revenue/growth goals then you're good. If you try to stand up to people being toxic, you're quickly removed from the company. Leadership takes credit for your work - On more than one occasion I've seen both leadership and middle managers take credit for the things their team has done while giving their team 0 visibility. Senior leadership doesn't seek to understand anything other than their own perception - There are numerous stories from Inkitt employees where they tell senior leadership something and senior leadership doesn't listen and turns the story inside out or completely misrepresents it and then you're held responsible for their bad take. You have to stay loyal, but they don't - There are tons of stories of Inkitt expecting you to give them the world with the CEO saying that if you're not working 60+ hours a week then you're not meeting expectations (it's not that serious, really, it's werewolf erotica) but the second you ask for better conditions or accommodations, you're thrown out the door. Don't enjoy AI Content? Don't work here - The company has toyed with the idea of creating AI-generated content from AI-generated authors to provide users with the personalized content they really want, but in reality, it's a way to not pay real authors and generate more money for the company. Unlimited PTO means limited pay - If you take too much PTO then you won't get a raise. They never communicate what "too much" is, so you're just left to figure that out on your own. I've seen this happen through 2 or 3 raise cycles now where people don't get raises because they used the company's unlimited time off policy. It's unlimited, but there are consequences if you use it Promotions only happen if you drink the Kool Aid - People are denied promotions if they don't live in SF (I've seen this happen 3 times now). You're told that they don't like to do "off-cycle" promotions but then promote people off-cycle. They think you're dumb and won't question/call them out on it.
