Pros
Company culture: Managers (NORAM, revenue-side) care about their teams and want to change what's within their ability to change to keep team morale high. Feedback was always constructive and and a two-way street. Retaliation was not a worry. Surveys: An annual company-wide, third-party survey was followed up by team workshops to address management issues and employee satisfaction; this excludes salaries and yearly bonus gift, which always comes up with poor ratings but were rarely addressed unless all salaries were adjusted across all career bands. Benefits: Aetna medical, Delta Dental, and vision insurance were good. Quarterly bonuses can be the equivalent of 1-2 paychecks if an employee exceeds all bonusable targets and Exceeds Expectations in their quarterly review. Also, 401K employee match of 6% is good. Paid volunteer days were provided to help company-approved non-profits. Other perks: Team events and lunches were budgeted and scheduled based on employee availability. The half-year themed summer party/event usually means great food and music. Booking Annual Meeting (by raffle only). Fully stocked breakrooms with free healthy produce, snacks, and beverages. Work-life balance (as hourly, non-traveling FTE): Managers have always been very specific to not take work home and were open to constructive feedback regarding keeping proper work-life balance. Salaried employee experiences may differ.
Cons
Booking Annual Meeting in Amsterdam: BAM (2 days of workshops, trainings, and a themed party) was almost always guaranteed for sales employees in good standing, but was cancelled for 2018. Employee morale suffered. Then, BAM was turned into a disappointing 1-day kick-off 2019 event, no trainings, no workshops. Later in 2019, the Amsterdam BAM was reinstated for 2020. Attendance was raffled and uneven across offices. Trainings: Multiple quarterly trainings in different NORAM offices, one DNA training in Amsterdam, and regional reunions were cut for non-management and restricted to online trainings. Other benefits: Travel reimbursement was offered on personal bookings up to EUR 1000, but only 25% of a booking was reimbursed at a time. Yet, salaries were till low-to-middling compared to other online travel companies. Low career mobility (from NORAM offices): You don't want to be an account manager, senior account manager, key account manager, etc? Too bad because that was the dominant Partner Services career track in NORAM. Telecommuting: Applying for a job in a different department/country felt hopeless. EMEA postings require applicants to already have a work visa prior to applying, and visa sponsorship was rare. Yet, EMEA had the biggest job variety. The company was inflexible on telecommuting from any one of the 198 offices. Job duties can be 100% changed at any time, but pay may not be increased: Account Executives were operational and took care of partner inbound via phone, email, and tickets. Account Executives also helped meet sales targets at times depending on the office. In 2019, the AE role was "commercialized" meaning we now managed our own accounts, provided partners with strategy/advice, and ran partner meetings without account manager pay because AE travel was forbidden. New AEs were hired at a higher pay rate compared to AEs who worked years at Booking.com. Targets: Sales goals changed to include itemized tracking of all calls and emails like a call center. Calls and emails were not bonusable targets, but could've negatively affected quarterly reviews (which affects bonuses), even if all other sales targets were met or exceeded. Bonusable product target tracking was faulty at times, then targets were thrown out of bonuses mid-quarter, only to be re-introduced the last week of the quarter.
