Pros
In my opinion, some of the previous posts have provided a somewhat skewed view of what working at CKM is like. While there are many valid criticisms, I firmly believe that the pros outweigh the cons for CKM. While it is not without some shortcomings, there is not likely to be a better springboard into the tech industry or the ability to find your place in your early career than CKM. The pros of working here, to me, have been: * The ability to learn new technologies, and to mold the start of a career in tech. There are a lot of intelligent, capable employees here who are eager to learn new things and enjoy sharing them with one another. Management is generally quite supportive of this -- there have been multiple times where the ability to develop in certain areas has not only been granted but actively encouraged. * Exposure to many different approaches and avenues for career growth. A data scientist at CKM can develop in the more typical duties as a data scientist in terms of analytics, but can also delve into other roles. Many have transitioned to software engineering roles as well as I.T. roles across the firm. This provides a broad exposure to different approaches, technologies, and areas of development that I do not think would be present at a larger company. For many relatively new to the field, it allows individuals to decide which direction they want to go, and the company is generally quite supportive of enhancing peoples' strengths while also encouraging specialization in data analytics and management. I firmly believe that this exposure is not only a luxury but is crucial to the development of all employees, especially when they are relatively new to the field, and is something that may not be plausible, much less encouraged, elsewhere. * Being a relatively small company, there are plenty of opportunities for people to get involved in all aspects of the company, including training, recruiting, pro bono, I.T., social events, etc. Many of these things I believe are being taken for granted a bit here in previous reviews -- I do not believe that many companies of our size will actively support participation in these areas, either due to size or due to the financial burden these things can introduce. This may be a bit overwhelming for some, but I do think that this is a unique opportunity that many companies either cannot or will not offer. * Client work is built from both internally developed experience in the field as well as leveraging machine learning, nlp, etc. techniques. There is plenty of opportunities to develop new approaches, and the field is relatively open to new analyses in the area. * All employees are given a voice, including new hires, and are able to contribute much more than would be allowed in a larger company. Much of our work is not only maintaining existing code, but building new solutions entirely from scratch. In this way, the onus is very much on the employees, which can have its negatives at times, but I believe is generally a positive thing for the firm.
Cons
Some of the cons mentioned by others are valid, but are overblown in my opinion. Since these have been mentioned plenty already, I will not go into detail about them. Here are a few takeaways: * With so many areas to develop in, many find themselves overwhelmed or lost in a sea of options. With client work being at a low tide at the moment, this has led to some employees not developing much recently without client goals and benchmarks to meet. Generally, internal projects have been managed as client projects would, but without this sense of focus, it is easy to become lost in the shuffle. This may simply be the nature of the work -- perhaps this isn't for everyone. * Because of the size of the firm, finding focus in a particular area can be difficult at times due to the variety of problems that we must solve and face. Specialization is difficult. While this may be due to the nature of the firm (something I see as a net benefit), I do believe that a stronger focus in one area would be beneficial to many. * Again, due to size and various backgrounds of employees, knowledge sharing tasks and best practices can be lost in the shuffle at times. While this is a bit of a concern, the amount of progress in this area in the past months/years cannot be underplayed and is due to continual interest and encouragement by employees across the firm. Nothing changes if nothing changes, and things are certainly perpetually changing for the better. Being an agent of positive change is not only possible here, but you are given the ability to do so relatively early on in your tenure. This should not be overlooked in my opinion. While these criticisms have been largely true for some time now, I believe that the amount of progress is unprecedented. Looking at the growth of the company in the past year -- even in the past month! -- one can see vast improvements in these areas. I strongly believe that we will continue down this path, and the ability to develop and actively contribute to many different subject areas and disciplines far outweighs these, in my view temporary, issues. This is, of course, just my take on these things, but I wanted to add a different perspective to the recent negative postings on here because I do not think they are representative of all employees' experiences. There is always room for improvement, but I wanted to shed light on some of the things I see as net positives about CKM.