There are wonderful individuals/projects and deep structural problems - Marketing Geosyntec Consultants Employee Review

1. Inequality. The initiatives for equal opportunity, gender equality and diversity are in name only. Make no mistake, a relatively small number of older white men run this firm, and they are happy to keep playing musical chairs in their positions, and to introduce lame duck initiatives supposedly geared toward developing and advancing other people. This is not unusual in the A/E/C world, but members of other demographics (gasp! are there other groups of people?) will not necessarily rise according to their talents or contribution at Geosyntec. Compensation and promotions are also largely opaque decisions made according to politics, whim, or bias, rather than performance metrics. Nepotism is also endemic. 2. Work/Life balance. This is the reality of consulting: the hours can be long, the client comes first, and you do what it takes to get the job done. However, with the exception of a number of grossly overpaid, underperforming male Senior Principals around the firm, in order to succeed you need to be an adrenaline junkie who works during your nights, weekends, and vacations. The culture is largely geared toward burnout, and I've seen a lot of quality people accrue too much responsibility with too little support. I was with the firm long enough to see plenty of talented people become grayer, somewhat bitter, and with less joy over the course of too few years while repeating the "Geosyntec cares about work/life balance" party line like a bunch of zombies. 3. Structural problems. The lack of infrastructure when it comes to marketing and business development information, the unwillingness of people at the top to make key top-down decisions, and an outmoded "sell-manage-do" business model are all issues that should have been addressed long before the firm grew to this size. Knowledge is tremendously silo'd, even about projects and clients, and there is an emphasis on forming inadequate committees to investigate long-standing problems rather than making the difficult but constructive decisions to create change. I find it unbelievable that a company this size doesn't have anything like a Chief Marketing Officer or a firm-wide CRM. Leadership (local and national) doesn't like to make unpopular decisions even if it would cause the firm's culture and excellence to evolve. Tolerance of bad managers or really bad hires is often due to a widespread inability to admit mistakes or hold people accountable. 4. Compensation. Lower or median salaries for most people and the bonuses promised are both inadequate and disproportionate to effort. Again, except for an elite group of seniors who make very little contribution to the firm.