People sitting in oak wood kitchen crowded around silver laptop looking at the screen and smiling.
Image: © Prostock-studio/Stock.adobe.com

How to respond to negative staff reviews on Glassdoor

7 Jun 2019

For many on the job hunt, checking Glassdoor is the first port of call. So, what do you do if there are negative reviews of your company?

In the eyes of jobseekers, Glassdoor is a great resource. It offers an unflinching look at a company’s culture told through the eyes of both current and former employees, all under the cloak of anonymity. When employees are sizing up job specs and determining whether they should apply for things, sites such as Glassdoor are seen as indispensable.

One downside of this for employers, of course, is that the reviews are not always favourable, regardless of whether or not they are warranted.

How do you respond to a negative review? Well, it’s as much about what you don’t do as much as it is about what you actively do. Your first priority should be to not react defensively. Doing so risks making you look tyrannical and, worse so, confirming everything that has been said about you.

Wait until you have cooled off, as seeing negative aspersions cast on your organisation can, obviously, be quite upsetting. Once have returned to it, you should address the criticism and take everything up point by point, countering with the measures you are taking to resolve these problems and what you will do to prevent them in future.

This kind of response shows that while you may not be perfect, you are ready and willing to be receptive to criticism and will address it head on. This will not only allay the fears of potential applicants but could, if anything, endear them to you further.

You could also use the opportunity to share some of the positive aspects of working at your company, though making this work is a difficult balance to strike. Some may view the blatant self-promotion as cynical, so make sure what you’re saying sounds sincere and makes sense within the context of your message as opposed to being shoehorned in. The sincerity is the priority.

This infographic, brought to you by Headway Capital, runs through how you can sign up to Glassdoor and manage reviews in a way that will help, as opposed to harm, your reputation.

infographic about how you should react to negative reviews on Glassdoor

Click to enlarge. Infographic: Headway Capital

Want stories like this and more direct to your inbox? Sign up for Tech Trends, Silicon Republic’s weekly digest of need-to-know tech news.

Eva Short
By Eva Short

Eva Short was a journalist at Silicon Republic, specialising in the areas of tech, data privacy, business, cybersecurity, AI, automation and future of work, among others.

Loading now, one moment please! Loading