Genentech reviews

3.9

73% would recommend to a friend

(3,708 total reviews)
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Ashley Magargee

81% approve of CEO

55% positive business outlook

Genentech has an employee rating of 3.9 out of 5 stars, based on 3,708 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The Genentech employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Pharmaceutical & Biotechnology industry (3.5 stars).

Reviews by job title

4K reviews
3.0
Jan 27, 2018
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Everyone is kind & nice. Hohos every Friday. Decent bonuses. If you’re full time, you definitely reap the rewards. Free lunches (if you’re lucky enough to work day shift). Yearly give back concert.

Cons

Where do I start? Management and leadership are ATROCIOUS! Most of the people within the company know one another. The issue with this is that upper management is too friendly with their subordinates as in they’ve been to each other’s weddings and have weekly wine nights. This leads to a conflict of interest because when employees raise major concerns over supervisors, the managers will always side with their “friend” even if most of the employees complain. Forget about upper management. The site head talks non stop about tequila. They say to voice your concerns, but you will be punished. HR is a joke as well—they are only there for the company. Also, contract workers get zero benefits even though they do more work than full time/senior level employees. Behind closed doors, I’ve witnessed supervisors belittle their subordinates, cussing at them, calling their subordinates idiots, threatening their jobs, etc. Back in 2013, the site hired around 300ish people to bring that new plant up, and look what the company did as a repayment: they laid off 200 full time employees without justification and 100 contract workers. They called people at 3-5am to inform them not to come in and even pulled people out of car pools to check their lists. What a catastrophe! We lost a lot of good people because some power hungry people in leadership had personal vendettas against certain people. Like I said, it’s a fantastic company of which I’m proud to be a part of, but leadership needs a clean sweep big time!

1.0
Jun 30, 2017

Political

Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Good benefits, smooth sailing if you can avoid the politics (but you can't). Overall smart people

Cons

Highly political. Some co-workers will throw their mother (or you) under the bus to get ahead. You are never safe because people move around all of the time and eventually you will run into the wrong manager / co-worker. Different rules for different people

2.0
Jan 30, 2017

Genentech culture not as it used to be

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- Good company to work for up to late 2000's

Cons

- Roche takeover in 2009 - Mismanagement at low to mid level since then - Nepotism is rampant - Talk of work/life balance is just talk - Salary not commensurate with added responsibilities - Raises/promotions are few and far between

Viewing 52 - 54 of 3,708 Reviews

Glassdoor has 5,058 Genentech reviews submitted anonymously by Genentech employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Genentech is right for you.