Company: IBM
Date: 2015-03-18
Overall rating: 1/5
Employment status: current
Experience level: Confirmed

Most frustrating workplace
Pros: The benefits are ok. It is difficult to evaluate benefits against other similar companies.  If you only need medical/dental coverage for yourself it is inexpensive, but add a spouse and the cost skyrockets
Cons: Salaries are low, each employee gets a serial number and is treated like a piece of equipment.  There is no leadership in middle management.  Just a brand who tries to dictate and convince its clients that the IBM way is the best and only way.  Proprietary hardware has been a downfall since the early 90s.  There are a few good products such as Watson, but innovation elsewhere is lacking.  There is a lot of bureaucratic mess to being an employee, and salaried folks are expected to put in 44 hour weeks in most instances.  Business development does not last long because of inflated prices, or poor contract performance.  Employees are expected to recruit college students for helpdesks and menial duties.  To them it sounds great, but to someone with 30 years in the industry it is easy to see and impossible to correct the problems within the business. Yes it is a matrix organization, but though there are many meetings everyone is totally disconnected.  Someone is asleep at the switch, and unless vast organizational culture change occurs, expect the eventual downfall.