Pros
Free water and coffee Some smart and talented peers
Cons
Below average industry compensation. Hiring managers will outright ask recruiters to find the lowest possible wage for new hires. Two coworkers left within a year, despite being asked how much it would take to retain them (the answer was no amount). Bad work-life balance. Unless you're fine with coming back on shift with mountains of untouched work. We were also told "you can't compare between shifts even though you pick up their slack." Very rare performance reviews. Members of my department were asked to submit a self-evaluation in late January to receive performance reviews in February. The reviews did not happen until July. A coworker received his promised bonus nearly two years after. Another coworker had to threaten to leave before receiving a 21% raise (matching an offer he had in hand). The next reviews would happen two calendar years later, when people were only given adjustments commensurate with inflation. Performance reviews are not based on any empirical evidence. During one review, a coworker was told his work was disappointing, and he would only get a bonus because he was promised one nearly two years ago. There was no suggestion on how to improve. Another coworker was given a bonus because he had performed well on a highly visible client project, with the disclaimer "if it was up to me, I wouldn't give this to you." A coworker on performance plan asked for proof that he had been not been performing up to standard, and for ways to improve. He was told "we can't show you the metrics." Middle management runs unchecked. Someone left around 3 PM on a weekday and replied "It's good to be king" when asked if he was leaving for the day. Other times, they would focus on playing a golf putting game, or playing with nerf guns. They take advantage of the lack of HR and institute any departmental rules without the knowledge of upper management. My department stopped reimbursing cell phone expenses, due to one coworker exploiting the system. When upper management was informed of this, they were surprised, but did nothing to reinstate the benefit. You will also be told to stop communicating with coworkers outside of work, and when asked for an HR handbook, you will be told "we don't need a handbook, these are the rules." Bullying and narcissistic middle management. After not getting what he wanted, a department head pulled an indirect subordinate aside and shouted "Your bosses are me, then [the executives]" putting himself first in the chain of command (in reality, he was fourth at the time). Even with the door closed, we could hear this being yelled. Unsupportive HR. For months, after the sole HR employee quit, someone from a completely unrelated department performed HR tasks. Eventually, a generalist was hired, but to mostly focus on benefits. When a coworker sent an email to HR to file a complaint, they could only suggest to take the complaint to the next level (which led to the person filing the complaint to get fired). About the above incident, when he was reported to HR, an executive prepared him on how to speak with HR in his defense, and even read the contents of the supposedly confidential email. Too many managers. For multiple months, my department was three managers and six non-managers. The most people any of these managers had reporting to them was four. Corporate culture encourages doing anything to get the attention of your direct superiors. Anything except doing your job well and honestly. Separate cliques exist, and there are great divides within the company between people who value appearance versus people who value substance of work. Your work and ideas will not get you credit. Going with the point above, anything you create here will freely get plagiarized, oftentimes by people who have no understanding of the source. The most amusing was when a manager replied to a client by copying and pasting a response from engineering which included the phrase "do not let the client know this." When confronted of this, the manager simply blamed engineering stating that the phrasing should not exist, despite it being written on a completely insulated internal communication systems, and tried to deflect the responsibility of blindly copying and pasting. No training. A training manual was being developed for my department for my entire time at the company, but was never completed in over a year. Management openly ignores the low morale. One employee left for a client, and management was surprised that it was even a possibility. Another employee openly edited his resume on his work computer during business hours without locking the computer, so it was visible to all, and later conducted a phone screen directly outside the office on the same floor as the Recommind office, and was overheard by others. Management encourages bullying and displays of rank superiority. Peers on the same level as you will try to gain favor by bullying you. Then they will claim you make them look bad if you happen to do good work. Management looks after its own interests. A coworker had an HR complaint filed against him. His manager just wanted him to fall on his sword and even said "sometimes you just have to take it" and made a slapping motion on his wrist. He proceeded to make this motion twice more trying to convince him to close the issue with HR so they could deflect negative attention from the department. Management had no interest in actually resolving the underlying issue, or investigating the frivolity of the complaint. Bad hires. Eight people after me joined my department. One was a good hire. One quit in a week. One was "laid off" only because they made enough HR complaints to avoid getting fired. Two were fired. Two were mediocre. The final is protected by his boss, just to elevate his status in the organizational chart. Bad employees stick around. With no real one-on-one meetings with managers, and no direction given in performance reviews, employees become complacent quickly instead of developing or improving skill sets. There also is little professional incentive to improve. Employees who are self-motivated will not be nurtured and fostered. Upper management has checked out. In an all hands meeting, the speaker mentioned that he was invited to join the board of directors of a completely different company in an unrelated field. Moments later (in the same all hands meeting), he admonished the company for not bending over backwards for client requests, insisting that we remain focused on our company and its service obligations. No exit strategy. Over two years ago, upper management got greedy and asked for too much when the company was actually valuable. Now no one wants it. HR uses shills to post fake reviews. HR sent out an email survey asking employees how they felt about these GlassDoor reviews, and are obviously aware of these issues. The survey purposefully avoided the real issues and consisted of questions such as "Do you feel your job is important to Recommind reaching their goals." Furthermore, the fake reviews are completely transparent.
