Poisonous Corporate Culture - Anonymous employee Korn Ferry Employee Review

1.0
Jul 15, 2018
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Some people up to the managers are really nice and amazing to work with.

Cons

Unfair distribution of work loads, executives will make their teams work crazy hours and weekends without reward and won't bother to provide any sort or support and leave the office by 5pm on the dot. Unprofessional and exclusive corporate culture, some executives will ask personal questions that have to deal with age, religion, gender, ideology or origin in public and harass their reports around and make fun of them. Executives will pick their favorites for happy hours and group lunches, which do not happen often in corporate anyway. Very insecure place to work, they keep their employment contracts below market and use external recruiting services to tell candidates it will all be covered in a really high discretionary bonus, DO NOT FALL FOR THAT! They will either say it wasn't a good year to give you a small bonus regardless of the doubled up stock price or rob people completely off their bonus and start a stream of lay offs claiming positions are no longer required. For corporate functions, this happens towards the end of the year right before you will earn your bonus, so they'll make sure to get the biggest advantage then can of people and have them do all the hard work before they will let them go, more like free of charge work. And when they do, they will prevent any current employee from providing any external reference for any other current or former employee. Just to be clear, do not think about this twice, you're stepping into a TRAP. Very highly political work environment that your direct boss won't find as shame to steal your effort and claim it all to themselves and show off your unnoticeable errors as a big deal so you will never promote. People who play more politics will get annual or biannual promotions regardless of their performance. Executives will accept and ask for gifts and some of them will discriminate between people based on who paid their duties. Depends on who you are trying to work with, most of the corporate executives are sick. Don't let them fool you, they do not look for strong talents, THAT'S A LIE, they're looking for obedience and never talent. They will hire very poor inexperienced people on executive positions to secure their obedience. If you think you're strong enough, don't bury yourself here, you'll be very intimidating to your superiors and they will make sure to demotivate you. Very abusive and unsupervised culture, if you speak up, you're out and they will make sure to make it the most brutal way. Executive management will listen to and spread rumors about their employees. No career development programs in place and no flexibility to allow you to enroll into one by yourself. Old-school culture and a boy's club, there's a limit on progression for people from certain races, origins, religious beliefs and ideologies. Passive HR function, they will hear to employees problems and frustrations and never take any action. Lack of support from the leadership team, regardless of how many times you reach out for help or how significant the issue you're trying to bring to their attention is. Its more of a war to get a higher bonus at year end by eliminating others. Leadership is unable to deal with the company's growth, they only try to please the investors and will do whatever it takes to get a penny increase in the earnings per share regardless of how it could negatively impact future periods. No long term vision in place. A company that size can not be just managed as a start up.

Explore other reviews about Korn Ferry

5.0
Feb 10, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

I am a consultant through a firm acquired by Korn Ferry and have had a great experience with both the firm (Salo) and with Korn Ferry as a parent company. Great to have benefits and PTO as a consultant and great training and resources available - good communication as well!

Cons

Transitional period during acquisition had a few bumps but nothing major and all ironed out as more time has gone on.

4.0
Jun 16, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The client diversity across industries and regions is top notch. Great brand recognition. The marketing investments in Korn Ferry Tour and LA28 paid off. Smart people. Remote work is a plus as 75% people work remotely. No push for facetime in offices. Work from anywhere! Everyone knows of Korn Ferry!

Cons

A culture of long hours and interrupted vacations. Clear demarcation between haves(fee earners) and have nots (execution). High expectations with outdated systems, manual processes, inefficient. Low pay as there are no merits due to market/company performance. Hard to get food at the holiday party so stop at Five Guys prior.

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