Company: IBM
Date: 2016-08-14
Overall rating: 1/5
Employment status: former

Don't work here
Pros: Not too far from where I lived
The brand name looks good on the CV.
Cons: They seem hell bent on screwing over their workforce, and this is totally counter to the culture that William Watson had set up.

Kettles were forbidden; that way the outsourced canteen is the only means of hot water, which has to be paid for. If they can't even provide something like this, how can you seriously think they will provide other benefits?

A lot of people that I knew in Finance & Accounting had gone to job interviews, and it was remarked "To start with, we will not pay you so much. This is because we are a blue-chip company, and we have to be sure that you reach our standards. We will review the situation after six months, however." Those people who raised this after six months were told "Either you continue to work for the only large blue chip company in Portsmouth, or you can leave." It was like an in-house joke that any staff who then transferred to a London location would usually have been tapped up by other employers within 6 to 12 months. This is what happened to me. It became apparent that if I remained in Portsmouth with them, I would be marooned. Goodbye, and good riddance.

The irony is that with regard to technology, the weird and wonderful bespoke systems in use are not used by other companies, so the specific system skills you pick up are generally non-transferable.

I found it very cliquey. There were people doing a damn good job, but they would not get recognition. Yet those who were in the clique weren't just employees, they had super-human powers, according to the internal communication. None of their leviathan efforts translated into any tangible changes in the workplace, though.

At the start of the year, you'll get a load of bullish American hyperbole about how some sectors are experiencing double-digit growth. Paradoxically, this "explains" why there are subsequently pay freezes, hiring freezes, travel expense freezes etc. It is like something from George Orwell's "1984"

If you do work here, you have to enter with a clear idea of what you want to achieve here, and an exit strategy. I just think that the time could be better spent in a less hostile organisation.