Colgate-Palmolive reviews

4.1

81% would recommend to a friend

(2,481 total reviews)
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Noel Wallace

86% approve of CEO

72% positive business outlook

Colgate-Palmolive has an employee rating of 4.1 out of 5 stars, based on 2,481 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have an excellent working experience there. The Colgate-Palmolive employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Produktion industry (3.5 stars).

Reviews by job title

2K reviews
5.0
Apr 19, 2018

Marketing Intern

Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

They are very friendly, the location is perfect for people to go to work.

Cons

The DACH marketing is very german. Not so easy for foreigners.

2.0
Aug 13, 2016

Decent company (updated)

Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Solid performing company. Few large companies have the financial performance of this company, over short- and long-term. Focused - does not stray into extraneous areas without deliberation or make trendy moves. Somewhat dependent on department, but generally decent atmosphere to work in, with some modern-day trends coming into existence recently (work-from-home, etc.). People are proud to work for the company and many stay a long time. Makes products that make peoples lives better.

Cons

Salaries are probably a bit below-average. Other non-salary benefits (e.g. hours, 401(k) match) offset this somewhat although the company is gradually downgrading the non salary/S&I perks. The company is very old-fashioned, and, presumably like at most companies, double-standards exist. Recently stopped forcing men to wear suits (finally caught on that it's 2016) but men wear business dress while women wear whatever they want (tank tops and flip flops in summer). Atmosphere is stressful and cold - people often do not even say hello to each other in the halls. Cynicism and sourness abound. This has only gotten much more pronounced over the last couple years with the attempt to cost-cut their way to profits and shuttle jobs oversees. Most Finance people are overworked (although it never gets to "sweat-shop"-type hours) and that probably adds to stress, and there is very little collegiality and career development anymore - no one has time for it! Cost-cutting also left those who didn't get cut feeling like they had to validate their existence with "work analyses" done by high-powered consultants. There also is a veil of secrecy and guardedness from both HR and upper management. Cost cutting even means some departments have moved floors twice in the last two years as they decrease the amount of space they lease, and many people have lost offices and even VPs have had their offices downgraded. All this cost-cutting frittering away at the edges (and morale) when they could just move from Park Avenue (we're not in the age of Mad Men anymore) to the existing facility in Parsippany and save dollars worth talking about. HR is not very good on the whole and neither is IT. It's almost impossible to know where to turn with an HR question. IT service is horrendous. This has only gotten worse with the move to a Mexican shared service center. Management skills are poor and managers are not trained to lead. Most annoying thing at the company is they pat themselves on the back so much with cliches and jargon about Managing with Respect and Colgate Values and then they cut people and let unskilled managers still exist. The company does a terrible job at training managers to manage. There are managers who are not very good at managing and have made poor hiring decisions and generally seek no input from their subordinates. They are not recognizing the talent right in front of them. Promotion is not good (because it costs money to promote people) and there are no staff in certain Finance departments, thus leaving managers doing staff/senior analyst level work. Premium is placed on ethnic diversity, even to the exclusion of attaining the most diverse (university-wise) talent.

2.0
Feb 1, 2021
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Market pay and decent benefits (especially dental) Can purchase discounted products

Cons

- fake reviews (see multiple one or two liners) - promotions are only done through politics. The system creates a network of untalented people helping each other land big roles they are unqualified for - strong leaders and good people have left in droves during the pandemic (huge red flag) - if management doesn’t like you can fire you without reason (or making up reasons). Legal and ethics teams will support these poor decisions regardless of how clear the facts are - tons of restructuring and movements over the last ten years, workforce is skeletal and therefore people have to absorb enormous workloads - too much focus on cost savings and chasing pennies and not on innovation - due to restructuring over last ten years hundreds losing their jobs everyone is worried about themselves and refuse to adopt a team mindset or culture to care about others (especially managers) as fellow human beings - gaslighting managers that convince the employee they are wrong if issues are raised -managers that don’t understand enough to understand they don’t know anything - mgmt has strong culture of finding someone to blame when things go wrong instead of taking responsibility - dead end job, no career development, 90% of people leave the company - managers bully low performing employees (rather than coaching them) to distract from their own incompetence

Viewing 10 - 12 of 2,481 Reviews

Glassdoor has 4,705 Colgate-Palmolive reviews submitted anonymously by Colgate-Palmolive employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Colgate-Palmolive is right for you.