Cognizant reviews

3.6

69% would recommend to a friend

(120,775 total reviews)
avatar

Ravi Kumar S

61% approve of CEO

65% positive business outlook

Cognizant has an employee rating of 3.6 out of 5 stars, based on 120,775 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The Cognizant employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Information Technology industry (3.7 stars).

Reviews by job title

121K reviews
3.0
Jun 18, 2013

Glad to be gone

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- Unlimited PTO - Casual dress environment

Cons

- Unlimited PTO. It sounds great on paper, but your time off (both when and how much) is regulated by management. Instead of being secure that you can take time off that you've earned, you're monitored and made to feel guilty. - Lack of camaraderie. Don't expect to go out for drinks after work or have lunch together. Depending on your manager, you may even have to get permission to participate in things like potlucks during the day. - Lack of direction from upper management. Even though we had pretty aggressive team initiatives, we never had a clear understanding of how the work we were doing fit into the overall goals of the company. This resulted in a lot of confusion and projects stretching out far longer than they should have. - Upper management was completely out of touch. Direct managers knew what was going on in the department but didn't have any real power. Upper management was clueless and made decisions that were not in the best interest of the company or the department. - Confusing internal processes and policies: multiple IT systems, no admin privileges on your machine, multiple passwords to manage. Very corporate. - Confusing bonus structure. After an hour long meeting explaining the bonus structure and the payout amounts, people still didn't understand and just resigned themselves to accepting whatever they got. - No clear communication about raises or promotions. Raises usually come around sometime between January and April. By June there was still no communication about whether or not there would be raises for the year. Most of the time, it felt like the product teams were completely siloed from each other. Teams working on the same floor were unaware of the other's processes or work. There was absolutely no collaboration between teams or departments. If you want to innovate within your role, this is not the company for you.

2.0
Jun 18, 2013

No Clue What They're Doing

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- Some really smart, good people working here. - Flexible PTO is nice - Relaxed dress code - Strong products - Market leader - Opportunities to learn more and be involved in industry changes if you put yourself out there

Cons

- "Leadership" is non-existent; they're just egos filling spots on an org chart - Senior management are spin doctors - tell you one thing while doing another, no transparency even when you can see through what they're telling you - All but eliminated the bonus plan; company never makes their numbers so bonuses are basically a fraction of what they should be - Senior talent is exiting rapidly, people with the company for 8/10/12/15 years are suddenly leaving; very bad sign - Constant reorganization seems to be the only task senior management has on their plate - Ready fire aim mentality; company chases "good" ideas without fully vetting them - No communication or cooperation between business units; staff members end up getting blamed or railroaded for things that were out of control because they couldn't get any help or direction on routine tasks - No true training for staff; it's all basic high level training with no practical value; sets up otherwise intelligent people for failure - Lots of roles that seem to overlap; tons of confusion as to the value offered by multiple people doing the same job; causes the company to be bloated and slow - Few (or no) people in the company who can actually make decisions; all by committee and all politically driven/motivated; company is disintegrating under the weight of the politics

1.0
Mar 19, 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Salary on Time – Because paying employees on time is somehow a perk now. Good Team – Misery loves company, and thankfully, the team is great at bonding over shared suffering.

Cons

Zero Respect – If you enjoy being treated like a replaceable cog in a broken machine, you’ll thrive here! Kiss-Ass Culture – Hard work? Nah. The real skill here is perfecting the art of corporate bootlicking. The higher you smooch, the faster you climb.

Viewing 58 - 60 of 120,775 Reviews

Glassdoor has 128,341 Cognizant reviews submitted anonymously by Cognizant employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Cognizant is right for you.