Company: Oracle
Date: 2016-03-19
Overall rating: 2/5
Employment status: former
Experience level: Confirmed

About the Communications Global Business Unit (CGBU)
Pros: Good salary, for Sales Consultant positions overtime is available which is unheard of in the industry.  Good people to work with.
Cons: Extremely inflexible organization that expects the sales team to produce without giving them the tools needed to be competitive in the marketplace.  Oracle operates this business unit much like their typical IT sales organizations which is way more rigid than industry standard for telecommunications network equipment.  

The support for the products is poor requiring the sales consultants to provide an additional level of support in order to maintain customer satisfaction to the level where customers are still willing to conduct new business with Oracle.  

The sales process is arduous requiring ridiculous processes for approvals before you are even able to produce a formal quote!  We often had problems negotiating the sales process even when customers were ready and willing to give us a PO.  One time we received a PO in early December and couldn't close the internal processes before the end of calendar year which caused the customer's budget to be lost.

In an industry where much business is done by equipment evaluations, getting loaner equipment to a customer is extremely difficult.

In an industry moving to NFV, you would think that Oracle would have a great strength.  Unfortunately the support rate for software only and virtual sales is 22% which pretty much kills any large deal once it comes to light.  Despite the sales force continually complaining about this, all attempts to change this policy have been shot down.

All of these issues have been highlighted for several years and despite management insisting that things were going to get better, very little change to improve the known issues has happened.  The talented individuals who work in the CGBU are very much disgruntled and I would expect much more attrition.

Management can be very petty when leaving to pursue other opportunities.  I left to go to a startup in a different technology field that does not compete with Oracle.  I provided my notice and worked very hard over my last two weeks to ensure that all of the projects I was involved with were handed off and that as much of the customer knowledge I had as possible was given to those who would take over for me.  I had worked fully to the end of the quarter before providing notice with a sales rep who was over quota but management decided not to pay out my quarterly incentive bonus.

Specific to my position as Sales Consultant, it was clear that the new management team wants to change the way this position functions to be less hands on with the technology and more of someone who only presents slide decks at customer meetings.  This was not the type of position that I wanted to hold.

While the pay was very good, I never once received any raise in my time with Oracle.  If you are considering a position within the CGBU, ensure that you negotiate a salary that you will be happy with for several years.  The overtime is great, but they do have a budget pool for this that often depletes late into the fiscal year and you will be asked not to work any overtime without prior approvals.  Lately, also, Oracle has been closing the offices for the time between Christmas and New Year's and forcing employees to use their vacation on these days.  Not only is this obnoxious as an employee, but when you are trying to close a sale before the customer's budget disappears (as noted above) and the right people are not in the office to complete the order it impacts you in multiple ways.