How often do you look on TripAdvisor to gain some insight to your next holiday destination? You manage to short list your favourite resorts or hotels and you begin to work your way through all the reviews left by previous guests.  The majority are positive, praising and promising return visits.  But then, you come across a scathing review, complaining about everything from cleanliness, the service, food, staff, location right down to the choice of curtains hanging in the room.  Do you take it that everyone has different opinions and experiences, or rather take a chance and spend your hard-earned money and precious holiday time on a place that could be 14 days in hell for you?

Glassdoor is the equivalent for job seekers and is the pre-dominate primary resource used. For a majority, it’s the single resource that individuals go to when researching their next potential employer. Glassdoor is touted as ‘a free inside look at jobs and companies’.  It offers job seekers a glimpse into the operations of a company and salary information.

For employers, it is also worth bearing in mind, that some candidates place so much importance on these reviews, that they won’t even apply or speak to anyone from your company because of it!  The big question is, just how reliable is Glassdoor?

 

How Reliable is Glassdoor for candidates?

It is important to recognise that the reviews are anonymous! This can work positively as well as negatively. Current employees can feel a sense of protection knowing it isn’t tracked, so can give honest opinions. Experts have warned that some disgruntled employees may use this as a platform to vent their frustration and at the other end of the scale, it may be HR representatives who are writing glowing reports to entice potential employees.

Things to bear in mind when questioning the reliability are that:

• There is no employee verification system;
• People are driven to write reviews when they’ve had a negative experience;
• Star rating – how does it work? Everyone has their own opinion. Are they honest ratings?
• Reviews Don’t Always Reflect a Company’s Current Situation – Change in management structure can have a dramatic impact and can bring rapid change. What may have been said 6 months ago may not be a fair representation today;
• Companies can have multiple offices in multiple locations. Because the reviews are anonymous, you have no way of knowing which location is being reviewed. Different managers, teams and people all add to the culture of the office and can differ from office to office.
• Reviews are not based on fact. They are based on individual experience and perspective.  There is no way to determine fact from fiction;

 

Positives of Glassdoor

The positive that Glassdoor promotes is transparency in the workplace. There are more and more companies exploring and moving towards being more and more transparent. There may be a way in the future that Glassdoor enables reviews for specific divisions and departments within a company.

Damage control for Employers

What should you do if you are the ‘Employer’ and your company has negative and potentially damaging reviews? If there are a few and your score is low, then Glassdoor does give you the opportunity to respond.  Rather than burying your head in the sand and not responding, you are showing that you are interested in feedback that has been left and that you take the reviews seriously, when taking the time to respond.  When responding you want to be methodical and not just do it on a whim.

Setting up a free employee account will give a company representative the capabilities to respond.   You will have a designated employee that will have the responsibility to respond to the reviews.

Own it by being transparent.

If there is something that is going on within the organisation, such as a management change or a merger that has had an impact on morale and culture, then be transparent when responding to the negative reviews. ​

Identify the communication breakdown. 

If you see a lot of reviews complaining about an internal communication gap and it could be beneficial to find out where the breakdown is happening. Knowing this will help in clearing up any issues.

You can use this information to find where improvements could be made to enhance the overall company culture of your company as employees see it.

Final word

If you are wanting to find out about the company you are interviewing for and you come across negative reviews, don’t let other opinions cloud your judgement.

Use Glassdoor as a resource, but don’t take it as a correct depiction of what is going on in the company.  See if you have any prior connections / former colleagues that work for that company to get their perspective.

You can use other platforms such as Google+ and LinkedIn to connect with professionals who currently work at the company.  Invest time to get a wider picture of what is going on to determine whether it is a good fit for you.

“Beware of false knowledge; it is more dangerous than ignorance” – George Bernard Shaw