Pros
+ Genuine, knowledgeable, friendly, passionate workforce. + Flexible working hours and patterns. + Good benefits. + Opportunities to experience work at other LM offices. + Good mentorship opportunities. + Quality of compliance training has improved over the years.
Cons
- Total lack of local autonomy; every decision must flow up and down the leadership chain, leading to painfully slow decision-making. - Training hard to come by unless it is critical for your job. Even then, you have to fight for it. - Inflexible customers; difficult or impossible to move projects or have time to do side-projects if you are fee-earning. - Empty promises from leaders, especially visiting MDs. They will take your concerns and promptly forget about them. - Technical positions are overwhelmingly male dominated. - Business unwilling to take any risk; any initial investment will be minuscule. - Business unwilling to pay for technical leaders (SMEs). - Promotion difficult unless you mix with the right crowds. - Poor appraisal system. You may be given commitments that are totally out of your control, and even if you surpass your year's expectations don't expect much for it. - Leadership overly reliant on people perceptions instead of actual performance. - Slow to react to new technologies.