Buyer's Remorse - Anonymous employee Vanguard Employee Review

Vanguard's work environment and compensation were significantly different than indicated during the hiring process. * Culture The claim and repeated statement is that the culture is extremely collaborative, but the way that this collaborative culture is enforced is by deliberately penalizing anyone who disagrees with the way things are currently ran. In this way, it doesn't feel like everyone has a voice, it feels like anyone who is discordant from that voice will be made to feel unwelcome to share their opinion, and will be penalized on the metric for team dynamics. The "collaborative culture" insulates everyone involved for behaving badly, as they can all collectively point to the rest of the group and say "we came to a consensus, my hands were tied." It leaves the individual employee absolutely powerless in most situations, and makes the entire emphasis on teamwork seem to be an construct that is superficial and artificially enforced. This becomes a particular problem when an employee feels like there is an ethical dilemma and feels a professional and personal responsibility to stand firm on a position. While the culture might indicate absolutely indicate that ethics is the number one priority, this does not preclude the possibility that there were still be a penalty for disagreement. * Compensation When the hiring team initially presents the offer, they add both the profit sharing bonus and the performance bonus as part of the total compensation package. Then they offer that there are also merit increases. They absolutely imply that these two items are very much a given, and if there is any reason why you wouldn't be eligible for the full amount on the merit increase or the performance bonus, because of the collaborative culture, there would be absolute transparency. What they fail to mention is that if you are at the top of the range for the position that you interview for, then your *potential* merit increase, no matter your performance, is negligible (between 1% and a half a percent). Secondly, there isn't ANY transparency with respect to performance reviews, and for a new employee, no knowledge of what the net effect of performance reviews might have on compensation. Numerous other new crew members I spoke to on the subject also indicated that their bonus and merit increases were less than they felt were advertised during the hiring process. Additionally, the bonus periods are in June and Dec, and you need to be present for December of the previous year to be eligible for the June bonus period. The 401k has a long vesting period. I do want to acknowledge that there is an option to take concerns to Crew Relations, but given the retributive behavior around challenging the status quo, I am confident that any failures to resolve issues at the team level will be reflected in further performance evaluations (and thus compensation). Issues have been brought to management's attention, and the response has been to place responsibility on the junior crew member to resolve any issues they have. Bottom line: I would not have come to Vanguard if I had been aware of these other considerations, and the culture is so actively hostile to newcomers in favor of legacy crew members that I am actively looking for external opportunities outside of Vanguard.