Pros

Their pay is competitive, their name may look good on your resume, if you are lucky you may work on a project that benefits you or is in your field of interest.

Cons

BAH is not a great place to work, at least not anymore, don't be fooled by the Fortune rankings where BAH is voted a great company to work for, it's bull, an executive even commented once during a networking event that she had never known or heard of anyone who participated in Fortune's ranking surveys, and she's been around a few years. This is probably because BAH handpicks who their reviewers are. Their hiring process is also very dishonest, they lure you with potential work in exciting areas in your field and even verbally offer you perks, but when you join, they throw you into any project (even in work completely unrelated to your field and with zero benefit to your career) where your manager can offload you and get billable hours for the cost center, and the verbal perks, well you trusted the company, and rightly so, so when you complain, you have nothing in writing and how can you fight with your new employer? all you can do is humbly walk away. If they promise/negotiate perks ask for it in writing, you'll see how quickly they rescind the offer. I also think this company is on the decline, going public will destroy their employee and work/life balance first mantra. As we speak they are now aligning themselves to go public and then they will be just another heartless grinding consulting firm. If you just want a job and don't really care about your career, then work here, but otherwise, you are better served working in a more focused company. I put my best foot forward when I was recruited (while gainfully employed somewhere else) and they basically screwed me with(out) perks and the type of work, don't work here, you'll be disappointed. About them going public, well yes, the Carlyle group, a greedy private equity group famous for buying and selling businesses. They bought BAH from the partners, or will pay them when they take BAH public and Carlyle cashes out as well, but their plan may not work out, in this market, they may not get top dollar for the public offerring, thereby ending up with the same amount of money they paid for it. Honestly there have been little changes and added value brought upon by Carlylye besides tightening up utilization of employees (and lowering morale) (which forces managers to make their employees do work unrelated and unbeneficial to the employee) and renaming their practice capabilities, renaming executive titles so they are easier to relate to for external parties, and creating new employee levels to again, better align with public competitors and possibly to halt promotions to keep salary costs under control until the IPO (these extra employee levels also did wonders to the morale of employees, now they have three more levels to get by to make partner, making total levels at around 10, almost impossible to attain at this point). BAH sold me and continues to sell the image of a company that cares, that is different, but in the end, it is just another corporation who only cares about the bottom line, their partners sold out to Carlyle, they cashed out and threw the 100 year old mantra out the window. If you come here, don't expect the world, expect to work hard and on unrelated work to your field, and you'll be happy. Once more, I have not seen any value creation by Carlyle, therefore a higher ipo price than what they paid for is probably not possible, they are probably just trying to liquidate BAH at this point and free up their cash (recognizing the bad deal they got themselves into and as they recognize that they are stuck in a sideways market for years to come). Investors will see the lack of value created and will not pay more per share than the company is worth, no winners here, everybody loses, employees, partners and investors, all for a quick greedy buck...

Advice to Senior Management

Do not go public, do not force managers to place people in unrelated projects to their fields or interests, go back to what BAH great, people and employees first, dollars and cents second (or ipo share price in this case)

Pros

High Caliber, Smart people. If you want to work in an environment where you are nurtured then this is the company for you. 401K is awesome, they contribute 10% even if you do not. Great name and great facilities. If you are in the higher ranks of the company (level 5 and up) you will more than likely be a millionaire soon. Potential for stock options when the company goes public.

Cons

CHEAP. You can probably make more money working for a smaller company. They have a lot of overhead so that is another reason they are cheap. They have to pay for all of the big buildings, fancy furniture, and non-billable secretaries. Promotions are not random but you have to be socialized in order to get promoted. If people do not know who you are then you get a thumbs down when it comes to getting promoted. I am only talking about the higher ranks (Level 4 and higher (senior associate)). Booz Allen is going public soon, so what does the mean for the employees? Will the employees get stock options? Will only the higher levels get stock options? Who knows.

Advice to Senior Management

Stop being cheap. Don't make the promotion process a secret or make it seems like on the people with the secret handshake can enter. Be more transparent.

Pros

The people I worked with at Booz were competent and highly intelligent professionals.

Cons

The nature of consulting requires flexibility on the part of the consultant with regards to workplace location, project subject matter, and travel. Consulting may not be a good fit for those looking for a more stable work/life balance.

Advice to Senior Management

I greatly enjoyed my time with Booz Allen. Ultimately, I left the firm for a position at a competing company that offered higher compensation and a better work/life balance.

Pros

Good company to work for that provides you with plenty of opportunities to network and advance your career. Big enough to allow for career flexibility while giving you that small company feeling based on the way the different teams are set up.

Cons

Given that this employer is a part of the consulting industry you have to sometimes deal with what you can get, not necessarily what you might want.

Advice to Senior Management

Allow people to better pave their path without trying to point them in the direction that you think they want to head towards.

Pros

-Great name to have on your resume
-Great people to work with if you're in the right team
-good opportunity to grow
-ECAP, 10% match of your yearly salary towards your 401K
-Commitment to diversity
-Rich history

Cons

-Experience will vary within the team and project
-Maybe too conservative or uptight
-Paid less than competition
-going public which means that management will squeeze every dollar possible to make expectations

Advice to Senior Management

-Don't go public, you will eventually become another SRA, CSC or run of the mill government contractor
-Get back into commercial practice, offer more opportunities to go other projects

Pros

I'm always proud to say I work for Booz Allen. In my 2 years working at BAH I have had very good experiences and at time when most companies are laying people off and cancelling holiday parties BAH is still going strong. I find that the morale is usually high and my BAH collegues are all high achievers. I like the 360 degree review process, where not only your supervisor reviews you but also your collegues and clients. We are also evaluated on how we give back to the company (although some may think this is a con, because it would require them to do things outside their normal work day). I have always been a believer that what you get out of something depends on what you put into it....and this is exactly what BAH is about. BAH gives the opportunity for an employee to name their own price, to name their own level.

Cons

Booz Allen is not for everyone. There is a certain "fit" for Booz Allen. From what I've seen, people who don't fit in with the core values of the company tend not to have a very good experience. Employees that do well here usually like a challenging work environment and like to participate in the extra-curricular work and activities, social networking events, brown bag lunches, training opportunities...etc

Advice to Senior Management

The leadership I have grown to know has been very motivating.

Pros

Very dynamic environment with lots of lateral opportunities. Attracts a lot of extremely talented people who are dedicated to excellence in their work. Work is usually very challenging and often is leading edge applications of technology, methods and strategic thinking, which translates into most people getting a lot of valuable career knowledge and experience in a short time.

Cons

While there is a substantial body of great consulting going on, a lot of the workforce is dedicated to body-shop contracts for US Gov agencies and departments, which translates into lots of people doing general jobs, not consulting.

Advice to Senior Management

Stay the course started by the founders almost 100 years ago - value the people, reward excellence and listen to those who deliver the promise of the firm

Pros

The work is very exciting and challenging. It requires associates to think quickly and effectively on high profile programs all over the world.

Cons

BAH is very challenging it requires associates to work over 80 hours a week and the job requires travel over long periods of time.

Advice to Senior Management

My advice to management would be to encourage their employees to take time off and to not work as many weekends.

Pros

Very collaborative, great work-life balance, respectable company, great location.

Cons

Only up for promotion annually, and salary increase is a percentage of initial salary.

Advice to Senior Management

Get better HR, your process for college recruiting is the worst process I have ever been a part of. It was really frustrating, and one of the main reasons I am not returning.

Pros

A really good place for working mom, especially when you have young kids to take care of. The office environment is friendly and professional.

Cons

A lot changes are going to take place in the next few years, yet to see if it's better or the other way.

Advice to Senior Management

n/a