Pros
Coca-Cola is overall a great place to work. The culture is unlike any other you’ll find in Corporate America. There is a strong emphasis on people, education, ambassadorship and development. However, you must pursue it – don’t expect your manager to hand it over. There was a performance review process that I thought was effective. You set goals and review them. Management is supportive as it comes to growth, feedback and opportunities. In Coke, there is what is called a “friends and family” network. You must be able to adapt and figure out who does what and how to get things done. The more people you know, the more successful you’ll be. Otherwise, you’ll be left behind. No doubt, you’ll work hard, long hours and sometimes swirl around waiting for leadership to make a decision, but you’ll never learn more about your craft. Having left Coke, I understand this to be very true. My skills in other companies far surpass the same level position. Working at Coca-Cola will take you to the next level in your career.
Cons
The Coke environment is very politically driven. This goes back to the negative impact of the “friends and family” network. For the most part, leadership makes all the decisions (it’s top to bottom always). Unfortunately employees do not challenge leadership and their decisions even if they know it’s not the right way to go. People just execute accordingly to 2 minute conversation had with sr. leaders. And, another negative thing is that policy is often created in the “elevator” rather than considering the longer-term necessity of change. More often than not, you’ll swirl around wondering why you spend so much time in meetings rather than getting the work done. There are meetings to plan the meetings then follow-up meetings to talk about the meeting that happened. It’s inefficient, but is a part of the environment. The communicate style is interesting and lacks transparency from the more sr. leaders, but overall the communications is strong and they drive brand awareness very well. You’ll certainly be shocked at the amount of money that is spent and wasted on a daily basis -- all because employees can not slow down enough to think and make practical decisions.
