Leaving Forrester was the best decision I ever made. Since taking on another job, I’ve realized how detrimental Forrester was on my well-being and self-esteem. I'm now thriving and gained back my confidence! Here's why:
- They only care about performance, with very little care about your health, your well-being, your research topics of interest, or your career progression
- The company fails to foster a positive culture. They hire based on expertise, but don't seem to care if their analysts have any people skills...and many don't. I know many HR cases that have been raised against them over the years, and I've been told awful things myself without any apologies. Management would be aware of how rude they are, but they would do nothing to correct this behaviour. Instead they would assign these analysts to another RA.
- The title 'Research Associate' is misleading, as you'll spend 80% of your time taking notes, managing projects, and being treated like a PA by some analysts if you're unlucky
- They claim you'll have more writing and research opportunities after you become Senior RA (after 1-2 years), but it's nearly impossible to find the time to do this, as you are still expected to manage a dozen projects simultaneously. All this for an extra 2-3k a year.
- Most RAs join with a positive attitude, only to hate their jobs past a year and get unmotivated. I don't know any RAs who liked their job. The company stretches you to the limit without appreciation, focusing only on mistakes. They make you work on so many projects at the same time then tell you how terrible you are if you are not meeting all the impossible deadlines. Why bother working so hard and overtime if that's how they treat you? You're not in IB making enough money to be treated this way. That's when RAs either quit, have a break down or stop caring, and performance start going down.
- There's no real progression, and tasks aren't engaging. Many SRAs get stuck in their roles for years due to limited spots for Researchers. Forrester knows that, and expect people to leave after 2 years anyway. Even when they become Researcher, support is minimal, and they also end up leaving.
-Management did many rounds of layoff, and couldn't justify their decisions. It just caused anxiety, panic across teams, with everyone jumping ship as they think they might be next, or giving RAs even tighter deadlines to publish reports quickly, in fear of being laid off next. This just created an even more negative work atmosphere.
