If I am discussing the company, I don't believe there are many cons.
As for the role of associate however, there is a reason turnover is high to be honest. After a few months, the role becomes less interesting and you learn less and less. You start to wonder what else there is (myself included). Of course the company is looking into this and is creating new roles (upwards and side ways) to retain the best talent but I honestly think they would do better to make the role of associate a bit different from what it is. Most of the day is spent chasing specialists/experts via LI, cold-calling, email until you have managed to recruit (invite them to our network) and/or screen them. I feel like the role needs more substance though I am at a loss as to what to suggest.
I feel that too many of our experts are not communicated with properly when they are not selected by clients and it can be very disheartening to hear about this. It is also not nice to deal with - especially as it is something we can avoid as a company if enough attention is given to it. Sometimes I think we focus so much on the needs of clients and don't pay enough attention to our specialists. It would be great if the new specialist associate role recently announced could really focus on specialist care and not be more of the same.
I do sometimes feel like hitting targets is as much about luck as it is about hard work for associates and client associates/project managers - we rely so heavily on clients not cancelling/postponing projects, experts answering to communications and the workload we are given. When projects change angles, as often happens, it is very demotivating sometimes that all the work you did so far has come to nothing but then you have to quickly bounce back up and almost start over. While I appreciate that this is a fast-paced industry and not much can be done, it isn't great that our output doesn't always demonstrate the level of input we have made. There have been times where I have worked hours of overtime to ensure I hit target even though I think targets aren't unreasonable. There have been other times where I have hit my quarterly target with weeks to go and I don't think I worked any harder in the latter situation then I did in the former, I just think some days/weeks you are much luckier than others. Also holidays/sickness are verbally taken into consideration but are not reflected on our records which I think is a shame. I almost feel reluctant to take holidays despite the company encouraging me to do so and assuring me that they will take this into consideration.
I do think there is a danger of micromanagement as more and more pressure is put on team leaders - especially with regards to specialist costs. Personally I do not like to be micro-managed and I really hope this doesn't become the go-to management style moving forward.
