Huge growth in overly-complicated matrixed organization
Pros
For context, the division based in St Louis has nothing to do with the credit bureau, run out of Atlanta. Workforce Solutions provides income and employment verification by contributing records from all of the companies that hire it to perform basic HR functions (I9, ACA, WOTC, Unemployment Insurance Management, etc). The database is also fed by partnerships with major payroll providers that take a revenue share on the sale of their member companies' employees' pay history. Combined, this creates TheWorkNumber (TWN), a database with over 100 million records, historical and current of American's pay and employment history. 1. TWN is a monopoly. No one else comes close to the scale and breadth. Equifax's growth is mostly driven by our ability to jack up the prices on lenders and government agencies that rely on TWN for income verification or eligibility confirmation. 2. Major technology investment is underway to get our platforms out of the 1990s. For example, we just deployed a major CRM platform to replace an outdated system. 3. Because of the security breach, the entire company is intensely focused on security.
Cons
1. High performance expectations with forced performance rankings leads to forced attrition of ~lowest 20%. 2. Highly matrixed organization leads to competing "fiefdoms" and endless meetings. 3. Demanding and unreasonable expectations come from the very top of the division. Until leadership changes, expect toxic environment to continue. 4. Equifax's mission is to help people live their financial best. This line holds true in the credit bureau and in verifying someone's income for a loan. But it starts falling apart when Equifax works for your employer to deny or limit your unemployment benefits or when the TWN is used to collect a debt and help a debt collector garnish your wages. For the most part, the services we provide in St Louis don't always leave our employees with that "warm fuzzy" that we're here to help people.