Gave my heart & soul to the company @ the WP site and was laid off after 20 years of service when I turned 50. - Project Manager Merck Employee Review

1.0
Jun 25, 2013
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

"Forbes' Most Admired American Company for 7 years"... 25 years ago. Looks good on the resume to say that you worked at Merck in the past. Pay and benefits acceptable. Severance package was great, but the company has scaled back on it for future severed employees.

Cons

George Merck's quote "... medicine is for the people. It is not for the profits" is now largely ignored. It's all about the money and "do it fast Fast FAST". The West Point site used to have a "Pride in Quality" program that promoted quality and doing things right the first time - even sponsored a day in the summertime for the "Q-lympics" with fun & games designed to highlight quality and promote that mindset. That program no longer exists.

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4.0
Jun 30, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Great benefits like medical/dentist/vision, pension, stock option, 401k match. Co workers are excellent, pretty good on site symposiums, lot of diversity clubs/activities. Innovation is extremely welcomed. Diversity in research portfolio. AI/ML is heavily invested to make databases more efficient.

Cons

Micro managing, especially within the biologics department, potentially others. Promotions are limited, and pay bump is poor. Company invests too much in buying companies rather than keeping talent - lay offs let go of great talented people. Merck is afraid of investing into exploratory biology and doesn’t take risk - they even admit they would rather see other companies clinical data or R&D data rather than taking a risk. Although it’s slow going in building new software, current databases are slow and needs much improvement. Extremely poor work/life balance.

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