Red Hat reviews

Meritocracy is not as strong as the old-boys-network. Building an org based the smartest, best in class, type A people requires management skills not present at all levels (promotions often seem based on technical, not managerial skills). Instituting change can be slow and painful - ruling by consensus is not always efficient or effective. Limited work experience outside Red Hat, many associates know only the Red Hat way. Not effective in trying to increase maturity in a large organization.

As others have mentioned, pay is not up to industry standard. Red Hat has had extraordinary growth, and it becomes increasingly hard to justify lack of raises and low salaries to the employees, given the profitability of the company. Career mobility is limited in certain departments and is very manager-dependent. A bad manager can kill a subordinate's career. Hasn't happened to me (fortunately), but I've seen this a lot. Speaking of which, we have some good managers, but we have a lot of BAD people managers. The skills that it takes to be a good engineer, software developer, lawyer, accountant, etc are a very different from the soft skills needed to manage people. Our HR is too focused on managers filling out forms as opposed to giving them real training on how to appropriately manage people.