VHB reviews

Work life balance does not exist, especially for junior staff members. There is a lot of pressure on junior staff members to stay late, work unrealistic hours and weekends. Overtime is bare minimum where other companies provide time and a half for overtime work. Morale was incredibly low and project managers take advantage of junior staff. HR and upper management were not helpful in solving the morale issues and would rather see people leave then deal with the underlying problems. The billable ratio makes it nearly impossible to bill to general admin time for tasks such as checking emails and responding to client. Many times, I had to use my sick time or vacation time to make up for hours I was missing, especially when there wasn't budget left for certain projects. Extremely high turnover rate in certain offices, especially in the case of younger staff. Not always the best environment for career growth, especially if senior managers are not supportive. Workload is always overwhelming and there never seems to be enough help due to the turnover rate. I always felt my work wasn't good enough and I did not feel I had job security until I was there for 2 years. I would not recommend this place to young professionals.

Soon after I started over 10 years ago, a manager quite high up in the company explained that entry-level employees can expect to work 55 hours per week to get 40 billable hours, which will increase to about 70 hours per week as their careers progress. I didn't believe that at the time, but have since found that to be entirely accurate. As a result, middle managers who truly do care about the people on their team simply don't have the availability to be the supervisors and mentors they want to be. VHB's solution? Hold more required workshops to explore how to improve communication and mentorship - which are, you guessed it, non-billable.