Solid Company to Launch a Career; Mixed at the More Senior Level
Pros
GLG is a fantastic place for you to start your career. You will learn and hone many soft skills (communication, prioritization, project/account management, dealing with pressure, teamwork/collaboration, client servicing excellence, etc.) that are critical for any young professional. People: you won't find a better bunch of humans. Smart, determined, competitive... very talented. Jr Managers are very strong, Mid Managers are average, Senior Managers are average. Culture: in Austin, it would be hard for me to think of a better place to work (energetic, smart, future leaders, friendly people... very awesome environment). NY, highly political, inconsistent (former Austin employees who transferred into NY are carrying the office), tough personalities... definitely my least favorite office. SF, it's similar to Austin but a more mature group... plus how can you hate being in SF?? Pay: much better at the lower levels than at the higher levels. For established or seasoned professionals, they certainly don't pay market rates; the level of impact for a strong leader is quite significant. Also, it depends on who you work for. If you work for a good division and a good manager, the pay is good and fair. If you work for a bad manager, better luck next time.
Cons
Three cons: 1) Senior Managers/Leaders: defined as anyone at the VP level and up... some of them are super duper awesome. Some of them are complete duds. Unfortunately, it's 50/50 in my opinion. GLG hires really smart, young talent but you don't get to pick your managers. If you end up with a bad manager, your experience at GLG will be way different than if you lucked out with a great one. Funny thing is... everyone knows who the bad managers are except for senior management... how is that possible unless... Anyway, for the fortunate ones who lucked out, they will pick up 10 years worth of experience in four years. It's just that... there are so few of them and everyone pretty much wants to work for them. 2) For seasoned employees: see above. If you are stuck with a bad leader, you're screwed. Your career will stall. My advice is for you to do something about it... do whatever it takes to transfer out to a different team. GLG does not do a good job of managing out more seasoned employees who are terrible leaders / performers. 3) Comp: I mentioned this earlier... comp at the lower levels are very competitive. Comp at the higher levels are extremely inconsistent. So... new hires who are young: decent, competitive pay. New hires at the management level: very inconsistent (really depends on how well you negotiate). The people who really get shafted are the middle-upper managers who have been at GLG for more than 2-3 years (the good, productive ones of course). Every year they get a pat on the back and a 3-5% raise. Not bad I guess but it's all relative. Unfortunately, if GLG hires someone today at the same level, they will end up making more than that proven, reliable, productive person. There is a 75% chance that the person GLG just hired with the same title as you is making substantially more money than you. Senior leaders/HR will not adjust your comp to market rate... ever. Somewhat demoralizing to say the least... As a bonus, I'll throw in a 4th point: if you want to find an organization that has the worst HR/people department... look no further. For an organization with over 1000 employees, there is only one competent person on the HR team. The rest are and have been a running joke at GLG for a very long time. That's not my opinion, that's a fact.
