Pros
I've read some very accurate reviews of this role on Glassdoor. I'm going to try my best to build on those, and be as objective as possible. I can only speak for my experiences in Personal Investor, and I understand the experiences may be different depending on which office you are located in. Pros: The people - The vast majority of people that I've met at Vanguard have been extremely kind, and easy to get along with. Vanguard hires a lot of fresh out of college graduates for their entry level roles so it's easy to find common interests and build friendships within your new hire class. My team leader has also been a tremendously positive influence, but I understand that this is going to depend a bit on luck. I have heard some horror stories about some bad TLs. The mission - Vanguard is a company that claims to put the client first. And boy, do they put the client first. That is not just a catchphrase. The entire company is built on making sure our clients prosper, and you can go to sleep at night knowing you aren't ripping anyone off.
Cons
There aren't a lot of positives in this role, so time to move on to the cons. The job - Vanguard does an extremely poor job of communicating what the actual role is going to be like. You will be slamming 40-50 calls a day. That is every day. Aside from a couple weeks after tax season, it has been calls back to back with no break. While this may initially sound doable, it quickly drains your soul. These calls can range from an elderly client trying to gain web access to being yelled at because an incorrect form was sent out by another representatives. 99% of the calls will be clerical. Like many other reviews have pointed out, if you are interested in finance or investing or the markets or pretty much anything that isn't customer service, find something else. You will not be happy here. I can guarantee you that. Vanguard claims to care about employees but churning and burning talented, motivated college graduates through 40-50 calls a day really shows they don't care about you as an individual. If you don't like it, they'll replace you with some other poor fellow out of college who doesn't know any better than not to take this job. The pay - The pay is sub par to say the least in Arizona. God only knows how my Vanguard brothers and sisters over on the east coast are getting by on 43k. You cannot expect to retain talent, or even keep anyone that is proficient at their job while paying this salary. For a financial services firm, the salary is an absolute joke. In a recent town hall meeting, one of the senior executives said that they were having trouble hiring in AZ. Well, I'm not exactly Einstein but I wonder why. Then they wonder why everyone who continues to work at Vanguard are mediocre, and clients aren't happy with the service they're receiving. It's because all the competent people have left for a salary that they can actually afford to feed their families on. No opportunities to move beyond a phone role - For anyone looking to move out of this phone role, it will be an absolute dogfight. Any department that isn't on the phones will have hundreds of applicants per open role. You have a better chance of being accepted to Harvard. Vanguard doesn't care to give talent a chance to prove themselves or even better themselves. The most qualified candidates don't usually get the job. Vanguard is super heavy into networking. It's like you have two jobs. Crush phone calls all day, while somehow finding time to bother people in other departments. It's absolutely ridiculous. For the unlucky 99.9% that don't get these roles off the phones, they're happy to string you along to another crappy phone job where they can churn and burn you for more calls for a tiny raise. Everything else is also a mess - Literally everything in the Scottsdale office is broken. The water fountain was broken for weeks. The coffee machines are broken. People get stuck in elevators. Vanguard is a 5 trillion+ company, yet people are getting stuck in elevators because we are too cheap to spend money to fix anything. Our technology is eons behind anywhere else. We're still using monitors and laptops from the early 2000s. We use software that looks like it was created in the 60s. It's an absolute mess. There's being at-cost, and then there is being plain cheap. Times are changing. Firms are moving toward being technologically focused, and not only are we behind; we're pretty much not even in the race at this point.