AT&T Reviews in Redmond, WA

Pros

Great technology-----some great energetic young pople mostly coming from the wireless side of the business. The company also has a few excellent visionary executive leaders (lost amongst some real fools) that may hold great hope for the future if the dinosauer thinkers can get out of the way. The company is doing a relatively good job positioning itself for the future and whatever the costs of the APPLE deal for the iPhone the realityis it is a linchpin in recent performance as difficult as that relationshps ultimate loss of exclusivity will be.

Cons

'old gaurd' of Wireline management has no idea of what drives success in wireless. The wireline culture is very 'old school'with very little focus on customers or profitability and too much focus on silos. The union people inparticulr have no level of commitment to succeeding in the market and are most interested in protecting their jobs, the status quo and avoiding possibly having to innovate.

Advice to Senior Management

Jettison most of your non wireless managers/directors/VPs and start some real focus on the customer and financial performance initiatives. Back to basics---start teaching quality methodology and inspect every function and role for alignment and linkage to corporate goals. Also be brave----be willing to throw the competitors off their games by being an initiator and not a reactor. A consitent and defensible customer message/corporate image over the long term is needed----not constant message changes.

Pros

Smart people, good core technology, adequate resources. Pretty good benefits.

Cons

Upper management doesn't seem to have a grasp of what is happening at customer level. Resources, promotions and decisions often based on manager to manager relationships and not on sound business reasoning.

Advice to Senior Management

Promote and resource parts of business that are generating growth and profit. Save your slashing for the loosing part of the business EVEN IF you've known those people and that part of the business forever.

Pros

Vacation time is plentiful and given up front

Cons

Benefits are pretty bad, for example MS employees get a better discount on devices and accessories than AT&T employees. Health Care is extremely expensive especially if you have a family. Promotions are few and far between raises are very small. very little employee learning opportunities.

Advice to Senior Management

Senior Management does not have much impact on the corporate policies.

Pros

None, unless you are planning to retire soon and have no motivation to succeed in your career

Cons

Lack of competency, poor work ethics, very low hiring standards, bureaucracy and politics. It is not important on what you know but whom you know in the company, to get promoted or get a raise. Most of the work gets done by hiring local contractors, who barely have knowledge or the qualifications to do the job. If you can get a job no where else, then you are bound to find one here, which is not a bad thing to bring food to the table.

Advice to Senior Management

Hire qualified people, improve working standards, treat employees fairly. The middle management needs lots of training, who do not have the leadership skills to manage or lead a group.
You not only need to raise the bar of the wireless signal, but also the bar of the people who work in the company.

Pros

Some stability and being in the mobile arena.

Cons

Benefits have become very, very bad. The old Cingular group has been moved into the San Antonio and Atlanta models in order to keep everyone the same, even though the mobile team is floating the entire company. Medical benefits equate to "catastrophic coverage" and require LARGE deductibles prior to any coverage by the company. Company officials are first to admit that they're betting on the fact that most employees won't even use up their full deductible. Bonuses used to be a nice "pat on the back" to the mobile team; but now, since they've been cut -- along with even such things as coffee creamer and forks in the break room -- AT&T is doing what they can to cut self-imposed labor costs so they can panic and hire new people to takeover for the people that leave the company. Alot of the mobile team is interviewing elsewhere. Not kidding in the least.

Advice to Senior Management

Stop just thinking about recouping the costs of purchasing this brand, and start to think about the implications of demoralizing and losing the company's life-blood. Also, if you hire someone immediately into a dead-end job, you'll end up losing out too. We rely on our management to think bigger and more intelligently than they currently are.