Bausch & Lomb Reviews

Pros

Excellent Leadership with experienced backgrounds. Easy access to Leadership too. The level of committment of exceptionally competent employees to get the job done is fantastic.

Cons

No career advancement from within. Still some dead wood that has not been held accountable for their lack of improvment or slow work ethic.

Advice to Senior Management

Start promoting competence from within if you want to keep your best people, if not done, then alot of competence will be walking out the door in the near future. Not removing the deadwood is one of the biggest impediments to affecting real change at B&L.

Pros

B&L has good benefits and lets you balance work/personal life. They have good people working out in the trenches but Senior Management needs improvement.

Cons

Senior Management wants to compete with big pharma and we just aren't there yet if ever. Compensation is below average and bonuses are nearly non existent. The pipeline is not looking too good for 2010.

Advice to Senior Management

Be happy with the niche that B&L has in the industry and expand on it instead of trying to compete in areas that are not profitable.

Pros

B&L has great benefits. It is a large company and if you want to stick with it, there is room to grow and develop.

Cons

My experience at B&L was that strong employees were overloaded, weak employees were not developed. The work/life balance was not good.

Advice to Senior Management

Work/life balance is something that is talked about at B&L, but it is not fostered. Everyone that I worked with worked ridiculous hours. There was a six month period where I worked fourteen hours a day. I was a high performer, but eventually left because I decided that it wasn't worth it.

Pros

Pretty good benefits, and time off. Some potential here for increasing your skill set, but not a good long term bet. On the other hand, if you are in a place in your career where you are comfortable, go for it!

Cons

The cons outweigh the pros: not a place to grow. Really poor talent management.

Advice to Senior Management

Some of the recent changes are good, but bring in more new ideas.

Pros

Company had some good long-term employees. Many have left now with new management. The company has a lot of positive brand equity with consumers, which continues bringing in the sales.

Cons

Very financially oriented, no long-term focus on decisions. Management and owners focused on improving their personal wealth, not the good of the company or long-term job prospects of employees. HR/talent management practices atrocious: good work on behalf of the company is not rewarded.

Advice to Senior Management

You are driving the company to the ground!

Pros

The benefits are very competitive and I feel that the company is certainly focused on the employees, at least from a benefits and compensation perspective. The 401k match is great and the health and medical benefits are also very strong. New management has been very open and communicative to the employees, which is a nice thing to see.

Cons

There is no formal mentoring program, at least that I am aware of. This is crucial at any workplace, for developing employees who are poised for growth within the company. There have been numerous changes with the senior management team, and almost all of the new additions have come from outside of the company, which does not send a positive signal to the rank and file.

Advice to Senior Management

Senior management needs to address the low employee morale within the company. There is a lot of lip service and ego stroking paid to employees, but very little concrete actions.

Pros

ability to balance work and personal life, local economy has historically been in decline so any job with a relatively stable company like B&L is a good job, 401k & benefits package are great, products and technology behind them is interesting, high level of diversity.

Cons

lack of business growth, limited opportunity outside of the firm - high level of firm specific knowledge, firm lags behind competition in some areas and lags behind

Advice to Senior Management

we need better information regarding business unit performance. no longer being publicly traded, a new means for sharing financial performance information with employees needs to be devised.

Pros

Fair compensation and benefits, and reasonable expectations in terms of work/life balance.

Cons

Lack of innovation, or support necessary to foster innovation and new product development internally.

Advice to Senior Management

N/A as senior management has been by and large replaced since I left the company due to their having been acquired. My advice would have been for them to be fired, which essentially happened (although unfortunately they all cashed out and robbed the company blind).

Pros

The people I work with are intelligent, caring, fun people working together to provide better eyesight for the world. They are always thinking of new technology, instruments, medications to improve and enhance peoples lives.

Cons

It is very hard to get time off without any trouble to take our kids to practices and games for their sports. Being in the corporate world is so different than a small practice. Everyone is so worried about what someone is or is not doing.

Advice to Senior Management

A happy employee is a good employee. Praise more often.