Company: Apple
Date: 2015-09-21
Overall rating: 2/5
Employment status: current
Experience level: Junior

Exercise caution if you are a minority
Pros: The discounts and pay are exceptional; it is the best-paying job in retail. Benefits are fantastic and you may work with some of the greatest, brightest individuals you've ever had the privilege to call "coworker." Freedom--to an extent--of self-expression. The feedback system, when appropriately used, is extremely beneficial for personal and professional development. Incredible access to professional development resources that don't necessarily have to do with your role. Semi-direct communication from head executives minimize the gap between retail and corporate. There is constant access to some of the best consumer technology in the US. There is a great deal of emphasis on extraordinary customer service, which is transferable almost anywhere. One of the most liberal work environments, period.
Cons: As someone said, it's the pinnacle of retail, but it's still retail. The secrecy becomes overbearing and we are frequently thrown into complex situations with little training beyond customer service. Internal questions about products frequently go unanswered, and we are left stumbling around in the dark, ignorant of our own devices. Morning meetings are tedious and redundant. "It's not about the numbers" but it is overwhelmingly about the numbers. Micromanaging is overabundant, especially if you are in sales. Organizational structure is, at best, weak, and at worst, crumbling at the foundation; a haphazard monstrosity of miscommunication. Resources for training, mystically claimed to be abundant, are hard to find. If they exist, we are not given time on-the-clock to pursue them. Scheduling is a mess. /// As a Black female employee in the Midwest, my negative experiences have been compounded along the intersections of identity. For example, a customer called me the N-word, and when I told my store leader about my experience, he responded with with another derogatory term in an attempt to 'connect' and told me that "the company does not protect [my] comfort." Coworkers and managers alike have made inappropriate racist, homophobic, and sexist remarks. Whenever a person of color tries to confront the issue of racism, we are met with hostility, gaslighting, and condescension. The turnover rate for Black employees is disturbingly high, but little attention has been paid to this. These are, however, the most blatant examples. Most of the time, the offenses are subtle: offhanded comments, being called out more for negligible, nitpicky things and ignored for everything else, half-hidden little happenings that make you think you're losing your mind. Promotions favor young, White men; they are hired full-time into the company, while my female, part-time coworkers, regardless of race, have had to work twice as hard and for twice as long to receive the promotions doled out to their male counterparts. Apple has a race problem. Apple has a gender problem. And it needs to be seriously addressed.