IBM reviews

3.9

78% would recommend to a friend

(107,230 total reviews)
avatar

Arvind Krishna

76% approve of CEO

68% positive business outlook

IBM has an employee rating of 3.9 out of 5 stars, based on 107,230 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The IBM employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Informationstechnologie industry (3.9 stars).

Reviews by job title

107K reviews
4.0
Nov 24, 2008
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

The experience of working across multiple customers. Ability to travel (when there is no corporate ban!). Lots of kit to get your hands on if you are in the right business area. Majority of people are sound. Working from home is encouraged. Flexible hours are encouraged. Big projects. Very big projects. you can always find someone to help if you know hwere to ask. HR is very important. Doing the right thing is encouraged. Worklife balance can be achieve if you are hard nosed about it. Decent tools to use. The really good people are promoted. You own your career no one else does.

Cons

Can be to big and to slow to move direction. When you eventually move direction, getting the rest of the business to move with you can be a hard job. To many processes. More time spent discussing an issue, costing more than the issue sometimes. Some strange business decsions are made without discussing even at a senior level the business case. Work life balance can suffer if you are weak. Rules are rules and once they are set you cant change them. Dont expect to change the world when you join. An expectation that senior management will carry you up the promo ladder is unfounded.

2.0
Nov 23, 2008
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

IBM offers a very flexible work schedule for many non-exempt employees. The workplace environment is surprisingly laid back. Many corporate procurement discounts are available for employee personal use.

Cons

Prepare to be smothered by seven to ten levels of management, depending on which IBM division you are in. At IBM you will be treated like an object, not a person. There are no "people" or "employees" at IBM (at least in the US). At IBM you are a "resource" with a six digit serial number. You will have no incentive to improve your skills or do the best work you can. Regardless of your accomplishments or contributions to IBM, you will always be looking over your shoulder and waiting for the axe to fall. IBM senior management gives a glowing report to Wall Street every quarter and then does a 180 spin internally to say how tough times are and we must keep cutting costs, we have no money for education, raises, profit sharing, etc. Medical benefits decrease every year. Prepare to go multiple years with zero raises and you may just get a 15% salary cut. Good luck with attempting to order supplies needed to do your job such as a notepad or pens. Four levels of management approval are required to buy a pen. IBM upper management is completely detached from how the actual business operates and works. Upper management management blindly issues directives to cut a certain percentage of headcount in rolling "resource actions" (terminations) and other expense with zero insight into how this actually impacts the work being done. Upper management is essentially in a sealed bubble, isolated from reality and focussed solely on two items: This quarter's earnings & the stock price. There is absolute blindness beyond the current quarter. No consideration is given to the future business impact of continuing to destroy employee morale and continuing loss of skills in IBM due to constant job reductions in the US in favor of cheaper "resources" in foreign countries ("Global Resources or GRs" in IBM speak). The remaining IBM US employees who are still employed (for now) are working more hours than ever before to not only do their primary job but to deal with problems created by GRs.

2.0
Nov 21, 2008
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

IBM is a good place for a diverse experience across a wide range of areas. I

Cons

Stagnant advancement, poor communication with management, older workforce. have been here for less than a year and have received very little feedback and very little contact with management. Opportunity to grow and move up seems to be very difficult because people tend to stay around for a long time. There was very little growth which also limited career advancement. The work force average age is rather high and people seem to be set in their ways of doing things rather being inovative. Instead of looking for new ways to approcah problems they stick to what they know.

Viewing 106525 - 106527 of 107,230 Reviews

Glassdoor has 131,657 IBM reviews submitted anonymously by IBM employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if IBM is right for you.