AT&T Reviews in Redmond, WA

Pros

AT&T is a huge credible company and is unlikely to fail or go out of business.

Cons

A lot of unnecessary and complex process specially after the merger to one AT&T which have made everything a lot slower. Too many levels in vertical in management hierarchy which limits the visibility and recognition of the good work.

Pros

Great team spirit, we all play well together

Cons

Sometimes hard to get much needed training

Advice to Senior Management

Lead by example

Pros

Access to leading edge technologies. Great work-personal life balance.

Cons

Low pay and unclear promotion path.

Advice to Senior Management

Act more like a high tech company (not a 'services' company). Your furture competition are of the former type not the latter.

Pros

interesting, deals with people, learning

Cons

late hours, stressful job, not fixed time to work

Advice to Senior Management

reach goals a little faster

Pros

They are fair to employees. Salary is very reasonable. Management is generally bright and have good leadership skills. The company isn't going anywhere.

Cons

The benefits could be better. Competition is fierce and expectations are untrealistic in some areas. Room for professional growth limited.

Advice to Senior Management

If employees are not happy in a certain position after a few years of work try to move them into another role - don't force them to leave the company to find a new opportunity.

Pros

Innovation ,work-life balance, work from home, resource availability, location

Cons

Intra team cooperation, project management process

Advice to Senior Management

Evaluate much differently

Pros

- Good opportunities for hands-on experience with applicable technologies
- Can be a good resume builder for someone just starting out
- Good 401k benefits with company matching

Cons

- Horrible and disconnected senior management
- Medical benefits are a joke ($1200 deductible before ANY benefits kick in, the company labeled this as a "consumer driven" plan, which basically means that the employee pays for their own healthcare
- Work/life balance is unreal. There are people on my team (on salary) who regularly put in 60+ hours per week with no let up in sight on projects that continually have money thrown at them with no real thought put into system fixes. If you enjoy always being attached to your blackberry/laptop and getting interrupted from your personal life to attend to issues on a 24 x 7 basis (even when you're not on-call), then you'll love it here. Release management is a joke - management expects employees to work on the weekends multiple weeks in a row without providing comp time during the week. Salaried employees, mind you. There's no overtime pay for all of these hours - I believe I heard there's a class action lawsuit pending against the company in Texas.
- Employee cell phone plan is ludicrous - I do get a reduced rate on my bill but it's only 20% of what a customer would pay.

Bottom line: I started with AT&T Wireless back in 2001 and loved it, and planned on retiring from the company if it stayed the same. We were bought out by Cingular and things were different, but not that negative - just different. Then AT&T (SBC) bought us and that's when I saw the downfall occur. Employee morale went way south, benefits were slashed, and even plastic knives, spoons and forks were no longer provided along with coffee pots being taken out since we had no "budget" for such items while Randall and others receive their bonuses. It's just made for a sour work environment with the lack of understanding from management about what a work/life balance really means. People put in their hard work, long hours away from family and friends, and really have no show of appreciation other than a form email from Randall saying "good job". Depressing.

I can honestly say it's a depressing state of affairs to work here....so if you're thinking of applying here, DON'T DO IT!

Advice to Senior Management

Please please please start listening to your employees. They're not whiners, losers, or incompetent - they're honest, hard-working professional team members who want to see the company and themselves succeed. They want what's best for the company so please make meaningful changes to the way they're treated, and they'll work hard for you. If changes aren't made, then when the economy gets better you'll be stuck with a workforce that's lacking talent because you drove all of your talent away!

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.