Decagon
Small (~210)
Poolside
Small (~150)
Best For
Decagon
Best for: Builders who want to ship AI customer support agents directly to F500 customers with technical founders deeply involved
Poolside
Best for: AI researchers who want frontier code generation work with genuine remote flexibility and Paris offsites
Ratings
DecagonPoolside
3.9
3.8
Overall
3.7
3.5
Work-Life Balance
3.8
3.9
Culture & Values
3.2
3.8
Comp & Benefits
3.7
3.6
Senior Mgmt
3.7
3.6
Career Opps
👍 75% Recommend
👤 85% CEO Approval (Jesse Zhang)
👍 76% Recommend
👤 80% CEO Approval (Jason Warner)
Culture Values
Decagon only
🚀 Ship Fast & Iterate💎 Strong Comp & Equity🎯 Direct Product Impact
Poolside only
🌐 Remote-Friendly🤝 Flat Hierarchy🧩 Wears Many Hats🌱 Learning & Growth
Shared
⚙️ Engineering-Driven
Pros & Cons
Decagon
- Strong engineering-driven culture with technical founders still deeply involved
- Ship meaningful AI features to enterprise customers every week
- Intense workload and high expectations — not a typical 40-hour week
- SF-centric; most roles expect in-office presence
Poolside
- Remote-first with monthly Paris gatherings
- Cutting-edge code generation research
- Early-stage with limited structure
- Comp may trail larger AI labs
Bottom Line
Decagon
Choose Decagon if you want intense builder energy at a $4.5B Series D AI agents startup with real enterprise revenue — but expect SF office-centric culture and cash comp that trails top AI labs.
Poolside
Choose Poolside if you want cutting-edge code AI research on a remote-first flat team (ex-GitHub CTO leadership) — but expect early-stage ambiguity and comp that trails the larger AI labs.
Open Roles
Decagon — 95 jobs
💼 Sales / GTM
32
💻 Engineering
25
📋 Product
7
🧠 ML / AI
6
⚙️ Operations
3
⚖️ Legal
2
📣 Marketing
2
📊 Data
1
🎨 Design
1
👤 HR / People
1
Poolside — 12 jobs
💻 Engineering
9
📊 Data
2
🧠 ML / AI
1
Summary
Decagon scores 3.9/5.0 on Glassdoor with a 3.7 work-life balance rating. Poolside scores 3.8/5.0 overall with a 3.5 WLB. That’s a 0.1-point gap on overall satisfaction.
Both companies share these culture values: Engineering-Driven. Decagon also emphasizes Ship Fast & Iterate, Strong Comp & Equity, Direct Product Impact. Poolside also emphasizes Remote-Friendly, Flat Hierarchy, Wears Many Hats, Learning & Growth.
On the hiring front, Decagon has 95 open roles and Poolside has 12 open roles.