Company: IBM
Date: 2010-04-14
Overall rating: 2/5
Employment status: current

I've had enough. Just one or two more years, then I'm out .. I have no energy left, I'm sucked dry
Pros: Working from home, good flexibility whenever the project allows it, looks good on your resume.
Cons: Basically everyone I know does something else than his or her proffession. Everything is measured in billable utilization, and if you're under 72% you're a "persona non grata", so you end up on the craziest shitty projects that no one wants to do. For two years I had to do stuff that was completely different from my engineering degree, just because no one trusts a rookie. You have to work on remote locations several days a week without concern for your family situation. Benefits are constantly cut off, reduced. They cut back on everything, and demand of you to invoice more. Everything that comes from upper management is "Work harder, people, it's end of the quarter! Oh, by the way, there's still cost freeze, so no spending" Education at IBM is a myth. The only thing there is e-learning, with a load of powerpoint courses that take days to read, and give nothing. Forget about going to real classes, those cost money, and we have a constant cost freeze since 4 years back. You want to change careers to say integration architect? sure, in time, if you get to work with the right projects, which you don't since you don't have the experience as an architect. 

We have an extreme management overhead, and extreme demands to offshore as much as possible. Management laughs and calls it "You work, we watch". The end results are often low quality work, or worse, missed deadlines, which result in cancelled projects, increased costs for clients, and in the end unhappy clients. 

You work hard, putting in extra hours every day for half a year or more, and you get nothing back. The manager might recognize your effort verbally, but never any material compensation. Raises are lower than inflation. 

We have endless meetings about the work. Everyone talks about the work, few people actually do any of it.

Management is afraid of change. Everyone is just looking after their own skin. 

If You're full of energy, and passion, look elsewhere, this is the elephant cemetary. Just the old people stay, until pension. Everyone with some ambition leaves