Unvalued Employees, Low Wages and Undeserved Promotions
Pros
If you live in the burbs, it's an easy drive. They have vending machines with snacks and soda. The building is climate controlled (sometimes). You can wear jeans, although the dress code apparently varies based on department.
Cons
Applied Systems is not a good place to work. Leaving Applied was the best decision I've ever made, and it's a shame it took me so long to do it. Employees are not valued and have been told they are easily replaceable. Some departments are better than others but good employees are treated identically to slacking, poor employees. Hard work is never rewarded (unless you're in Sales). Some departments, such as Implementation, have zero training and no guidance whatsoever. You're lucky if you see your supervisor twice a month. No one tells you what's going on or what your expectations are. People transfer there because they get paid more money but then they suffer and struggle to find out what they should be doing. It's disorganized and frustrating. Testing and Quality Assurance are a little bit better because you have some sort of concept of what your job is but the structure is still poor. Like other departments, you're thrown to the wolves and expected to work your hardest and if you do, the raises are so poor and insulting you wonder why you bother in the first place. Support is treated like an entry level job but seems to be the only area with an actual structured new hire program. You are welcomed to the company and a team takes responsibility for your training and clearly outlines what the process will be. The expectations are set and reviews of material are even provided. Then, training ends. The training period for support is too short and you're not allowed to retake the classes if you're in Software Support. Once you are sent to your team, most of the supervisors do not know what to do with you and some assign you labs which appear to be a way for them to avoid working with you or letting you know what you should be doing. When I was in support (which I left as soon as I could), the supervisors acted as if every question I asked was an imposition and I had no business coming to them for help. (The one exception is the DORIS supervisor. He was helpful.) Software Support is by far the worst of all of the Support departments and demonstrates time and time again how little they care for their employees. The Support department is also not really support. They are data analysts. They are manipulating data within the databases and testing problems in different environments and on multiple versions, yet they're paid like they are receptionists. I asked a number of times to be able to take a few of the classes again and the supervisors said no. Instead, I was force to take more advanced classes though I was not comfortable with the introductory concepts. With supervisors who do nothing all day (I mean nothing) and laughable wages, I left that department as soon as I could and went to Implementation. I found out quickly I was paid 10K less than someone hired from outside with no experience in our software. Why would I want to continue to work there when I've put in years of hard with with a company and someone gets so much more than I do?