Blackbaud Reviews

Pros

Educated employees
Friendly staff and comfortable building
Decent compensation for the area

Cons

Work never seemed to be good enough
Training program will NOT prepare you for the task at hand
Many employees have been working in this call center a LONG time and are not open to new people, nor are interested in assisting these new employees.

I had an issue and went to HR. The director told me she was personal friends with my manager and did not believe me regarding the situation.

Advice to Senior Management

Become more approachable
Show concern for employees and not your own stats
When you offer further training courses actually lead them, and not just throw employees under the bus

Pros

Working with nonprofits. Charleston is a nice place to live if you love the outdoors.

Cons

Not particularly innovative in technology or business model. Difficult to hire top professional services teams. Somewhat confusing internally since the Kintera acqusition.

Advice to Senior Management

Make an investment in professional services resources to handle complex client projects.

Pros

Blackbaud values its employees, they hires great people and that makes it an enjoyable place to go to work. They will push you to be your best and your career can be as successful as you make it.

Cons

The benefits packages are not great, but it is probably comparable to what most mid-market software companies are able to offer. If you don't direct your career you could get lost in the shuffle.

Advice to Senior Management

Increase employee pay. Invest in technology, underfunding the software and hardware that is running the business will prevent the business from reaching their goals.

Pros

Blackbaud serves the Nonprofit world with technology solutions that support customer missions. As someone who cares about philanthropy it is extremely rewarding to see our customers succeed and to feel that, in some small way, I contributed to that success.

Cons

Blackbaud has been in growth mode for many years and continues to grow at a rapid pace. This creates a fast-paced work environment where people are expected to work very long, hard hours, and a healthy work-life balance often takes a backseat to achieving corporate goals. Compensation levels seem to be below industry standards, although it does appear that new talent is coming in at more standard compensation levels.

Advice to Senior Management

Stop trying to do everything you can think of to drive sales and revenue growth and focus on what you do best. Most employees feel conflicted with too many high priority initiatives and too little time to do everything with the highest quality possible. It would also do wonders for employee morale if pay grades were established and salaries were leveled for like positions.

Pros

Fair pay
Access to many great organizations (clients)

Cons

Middle Management is worse than clueless...they are a liability
Self promoting and classic mushroom management style
BB lost the vision of the founders ... it is purely about $$$ and covering your @ss

Advice to Senior Management

listen to all employees .. don't trust the hierarchy because you are not hearing the truth.

Pros

Creating Software for the Non-Profit community
Working with people that have a passion for Non-Profits
Co-workers are sharp and highly intelligent

Cons

This is a work hard environment, so you need to be up for the task and that environment
Would prefer to have more technology firms in this area- but that is more with the area than Blackbaud

Advice to Senior Management

I think our managment team is strong and is taking the organization in the right direction. I don't have any additional advice.

Pros

There's a gym in the building. Generally speaking, employees are nice and easy to get along with. The exceptions are fortunately few, and unfortunately in positions of authority.

Cons

Management has much to be desired (see caveat in pros section).

Advice to Senior Management

Already given by so many others as well; none of the advice was heeded.
Treat your employees with respect.
Treat your employees fairly.
Take responsibility for the product you manage.
Look to yourself first for reasons why your admittedly smart and talented employees don't succeed.
Be humble, especially if you were promoted simply by being there longer than other people.
If you feel like you might be doing something wrong, you probably are.
Your employees are smarter than you think they are and that's why they are leaving in droves.

Pros

Great people in Cambridge
Make an impact on the non profit industry
Oppurtunity to work with top management and get recognized

Cons

It started to turn into a machine where you just show up, shut off, do work, and then go home.

Advice to Senior Management

The pay was a little low and little room to move up financially. Benefits were great but no bonuses sucked.

Pros

Blackbaud has a great team of senior management (CEO and SVPs). The lower level managers are very good, as well which is nice because that is where the most interaction takes place. Blackbaud is very good at recognizing skills/abilities of consultants. Tend to rely on a few consultants fro heavy lifting, so if you're one of those, it's very good. Would strongly recommend learning as many products as possible since the main way to judge a consultant is billable hours. Casual environment and very easy to "disappear" for a few hours or a day without being charged vacation. As long as the work is done, every seems to be happy. Fun environment and great location to work for younger people just starting a career. For those that want to move up in a company, Blackbaud is still too small and management opps only come along during re-orgs and when someone leaves, which for management is rare.

Cons

Professional Services Management prefers to focus on utilization of consultants rather than customer service. Many times it's more important to get the billable hours in and hit a target than to ensure that the customer is happy. Uses bonus plan to penalize consultants for not performing on petty tasks. Very poor onboarding and training process for consultants. Many times new hires are thrown to the wolves in order to start billing. Lower level management is great and if you're stuck with a manager that you don't get along with you can pretty easily move teams. The problem is the middle to mid-upper management (Directors and VPs). They seem to have "fallen" into their roles with little ability to provide a consistent and balanced workplace. They take things very personally and if anyone criticizes or questions they're ignored and discounted.

Advice to Senior Management

Lower level and Senior Management is great. Marc knows software and the non-profit industry very well. Most departments are great, however for Professional Services its a challenge as none of the mid level to mid-upper level management knows how to run a consulting practice. I would take a giant step back and truly focus on creating a balance between customer service and utilization. Short term revenue is nice, but is customer satisfaction is sacrificed for it then long-term revenue will continue to suffer.

Pros

Casual atmosphere, great location, educated and experienced workforce

Cons

Poor integration of business units, casual approach to IT infrastructure and security

Advice to Senior Management

Blackbaud offers many products and services that are redundant which confuses customers and employees.