In the valley of death we walked, now we're far above the valley floor with nothing but more peaks to achieve!
Pros
Good leadership and vision from CEO, Tim Armstrong. Great executor as COO, Artie Minson. Company has a clear vision to execute against at the heart of it: "deliver great content/products at scale monetized through advertising and subscriptions". It is so nice to have a leadership team at the top that seems to be on the same page and working together instead of backstabbing one another or simply not engaging with their peers as we've had in the past. Lots of different things and projects to work on means never a dull moment and you are constantly learning new skills and growing, if you want to. On the flip side, if you prefer to be a heads down executor there is plenty of things to do to make sure the company is running smoothly and supporting the change and innovation going on around you... just make sure you change and adapt as required, but in general if you like to deliver consistently, there is probably a role for you somewhere at AOL as well. The culture at AOL has improved significantly and continues to. Realizing that a company has a culture which can be shaped through talent selection and just reflecting on it is a big step that a lot of companies haven't taken like AOL has. While it can be thought of us a non-important part of a company, folks have to remember they're likely to spend more of their lives at work than anywhere else, why not find a culture that you can respect and appreciate and surround yourself with it. More mundane things: AOL UnUniversity is an excellent program where employees share their knowledge with other employees; much better than the standard structured corporate classes. Time away from work is encouraged to recuperate when there is a bit of a break in the bustling work of rebuilding a company; that time away is supported with 3-5 weeks vacation a year and 12 holidays. We finally have a good insurance company in Cigna; prior primary offering of United Health left a lot to be desired and alternative BC/BS was just okay at best.
Cons
Sometimes vision is muddled with strange phrases and ideas such as calling our primary websites cities and smaller websites towns with bridges and tunnels between them to recirculate traffic and other support infrastructure like power plants and other weirdness; a lot of the staff (generally the 1500 or so technologist) just scratch their heads wondering why such colorful phrases are used to represent relatively straightforward topics. The employee ranking/rating system seems to have gotten better for 2012 reviews; but it still can encourage backstabbing amongst the employees and generally is not positive for employee morale. Most folks do appreciate differentiated bonus/stock based on performance so in order to meet that desire they understand that ranking must occur. However having a minimum (or even a target %) of people to fill bottom buckets of Not Meeting Expectations and Off-Track of Expectations is completely bonkers. Fire people when the need to be fired, put them onto Performance Improvement Plans when they need to be, but do not automatically assume there is a certain percentage of employees that fall into those categories. There still is not as tight of a integration between Product and Technology as there should be. This does not mean they have to report to the same boss, but Product and Technology do have to collaborate at all stages from initial idea to deployment to ensure success. Things are starting to improve here over the last 9 months or so.
