Pros
- Benefits seem to be in line with companies of similar size in the industry, e.g. (401k match up to 6%), reasonable employee contributions for medical/dental/vision - Good amount of PTO for new associates; however, you are required to use a few PTO days during the company-wide holiday shutdown, and you do not receive any separate sick days, floating days or bereavement days - Good brand equity on a resume for future employment opportunities
Cons
- Claim culturual values of the company are 'meritocracy' and 'transparency.' However, I do not think this extends to the sales org. Many incompetent people have been promoted based on favoritism and internal politics. Yes, this happens everywhere, but other companies don't claim to have a transparent meritocracy. If RH is going to be like every other company, then don't claim you do one thing and not enforce it by your actions. Actions always speak louder than words. - Along with the above, the org sometimes feels a little incestuous for a publicly traded company. They have a lot of RH lifers that are now upper managers and execs that have been promoted WAY beyond their actual ability level solely because they've been with the company a long time. They are now simply coasting in their cushy roles and not motivating subordinates or implementing positive changes...they are content with the status quo so as not to interrupt their gravy trains! - Red Hat as a company, and especially sales, is very male dominated. Yes, this is true in technology, but it's especially evident at Red Hat. For example, there are very few women in the channel sales org and field/inside sales. How have they not been hit with a gender discrimination lawsuit? I have been on sales calls where it's more of a "frat house" type mentality, with profanity flying and no regard for professionalism, which made me uncomfortable and alienated. - Culture of secrecy, gossip & backstabbing is common in sales. For example, I don't know what my 1st line manager and "director" actually DO. Again, it seems they are just on a gravy train surfing the internet all day and flying around trying to "look" busy, but it's all a facade. I have never once been asked how I'm doing or what I think could be improved. It's very much a "we don't want to know and don't need your feedback" type scenario, because providing reasonable feedback would require work on management's part to actually address and make a change, which they've made clear through their actions and promotions they have no desire to do. The people who are promoted are the "yes men" types who say everything is great to management, even if they have complained about it in gossip with coworkers. - Lots of 'low rent' hires recently. Seems with Red Hat's growth, they are lowering their standards for the sales org and hiring anyone off the street in certain geos. I don't know if this is a talent acquisition team problem, but I've noticed management has an attidue of "that person will do" when the attitude should be "is that person going to be a rockstar in this role & an asset to red hat?" As a result, several chronically lazy people (to the point where it's laughable) have been hired and will probably be coasting in their current role indefinitely since there are often no repercussions for bad behavior. - Compensation is starting to lack. The execs are making out like bandits, but unless you have the right manager to advocate for you, do not expect raises beyond 3-5% (sometimes waiting for an 18 month cycle or longer). This can be frustrating if you are trying to be evaluated on a more regular cadence or are underpaid for your experience solely because you have a manager who doesn't want to advocate for you. - Can be very difficult to partner with internal departments to close business - much more so than many tech companies. RH is very legal-driven instead of sales & customer-driven. This creates kind of an arrogant attitude that prevents business from getting closed unless the client meets RH's sometimes absurd demands, even down to basic things like info listed on a PO, order form etc that RH will hold up closing deals for. Red Hat is NOT HP some huge conglomerate, they need to take a customer-centric sales approach and create win-win situations to close business where the CUSTOMER is first. Without the customer, where would the business be? This can be frustrating to navigate for folks coming from companies with more pro-sales mentalities and fully baked systems in place. - Too many disparate internal systems for sales org. The way they roll systems out, it's like you are working for a 20 person company based out of a Silicon Valley house. Half the stuff they roll out is broken and glitchy, then you have to do extra work just to accomplish the same task that was working fine before. The rest of the time, they system they deploy doesn't have the functionality the prior system does, so you're forced to use something that actually makes it more challenging to do their job simply because some manager or analyst was trying to justify their own job. - Really cheap with company expenses. For example, we went on a trip and the manager had to literally send out 5-10 "reminders" about watching expenses, trying to get free food, etc. It came across as "we don't trust you to act like adults." They could have easily said, this is the per diem, don't exceed the per diem. Instead, it's like veiled reminders that you shouldn't spend any money (even though we are allotted the per diem), but they don't want to come out and say that directly. The ambiguity makes it stressful and makes it seem like you're not valued as an employee and part of the company, especially when other departments have more of a carte blance mindset.