Pros
• Salary is competitive with other firms in the DC area. • The company has low overhead because there are no offices in DC; the staff just utilizes client space. • The company has a Christmas party (free of charge) each year to get as many as possible of the staff from different offices together in one location. • The company has (mostly) good clients and their reputation helps them continue to win the re-competes.
Cons
• Leadership pushes the idea of a “remote workforce” in all proposals and on client sites (“get a resource from Blacksburg to do it”) but this is not engrained in the culture of the company. It’s not a real solution. It could be cost-efficient, but without time dedicated to manage and coach the remote resources, it will not (and does not) work. • The company has not ironed out its growing pains, and leadership is very hesitant to implement changes to make employees’ happier. Their processes and systems / softwares are great to support a 20 person company, not 150 people. They claim to have a flat organization yet the bureaucracy of getting something approved and implemented is more convoluted than pushing an idea at the Big 4. • The leadership of the company constantly makes temporary fixes to get the issues off their plate rather than taking the time to make a good, long-term, and transparent decisions. The more you move up in the organization, the more of this you see. • Most management teams that I worked with are out of touch with the work that the teams perform and there is no culture for upward feedback to coach / mentor managers. • The same individuals are tapped for initiatives, rather than spreading opportunities out and providing mentoring to new people – they are not compensated or appreciated, and this leads to burnout! • Bottom line is that JPI leadership is very resistant to change, has not improved with their rate of growth, and decisions are not in the best interest of employees.