Company: IBM
Date: 2015-12-20
Overall rating: 2/5
Employment status: former
Experience level: Senior

Management Bloated / Desperate
Pros: Loved traveling as a F/T consultant, working in different places, meeting new people, and each assignment is never the same. Loved the constant change.
Cons: 1) When I started in 1999, there were only 6 levels between myself and the CEO. Today, there are 10 levels. You can imagine each level is more costly then the other. 
2) In the last 4 years, no raises, barely any bonuses, went to 44 hrs/week, required to spend 40 hrs of our own time training ourselves (class training denied unless for a specific client), and 401k match is only given at EOY, assuming you are still employed with them. 
3) High utilization (billing to the client) is required, without regard to your earned vacation. (Told "Well you can just work more hours".) Last few years, often management was not able to provide 2 weeks f you were being rolled off a project earlier then estimated. Hard to keep up your utilization when you can't control when you'll be at a project.
4) You have multiple managers to please (your personal mgr and multiple client staff/managers). I never minded this part, but when IBM replaced a manager knowledgeable in HR issues with a manager who isn't experienced with HR issues, I felt cheated.
5) Used to feel part of something good. Expectations became too unrealistic. 

From 1999 until approx. 2010, I was proud to be an IBMer. Since then, IBM seems to cater to the stockholders, then the product.  Seems that successful companies put their product 1st, then project. If done correctly, people are rewarded.