CSC UK Reviews

Pros

Allows flexible working locations, Salaries are ok to start with but need to negotiate well when you start, different clients.

Cons

not much industry recognised training.

Advice to Senior Management

provide more training

Pros

- Flexible benefits mean up to 40 days leave.
- Working from home is an option

Cons

- I'm 100% billable. Therefore I need to find project to fill _all_ my time.
- I'm responsible for hunting down 'cost codes' to bill to.
- Penny wise and pound foolish - expenses are severely curtailed, when realistically - occasionally, face to face meetings save a lot more man hours than they'd 'cost'.
- In the business of selling time and materials.

Advice to Senior Management

- Billable hours is a worthless commodity to trade in, as it's self devaluing. Focus instead on providing a service. Don't bill by the hour, as that _only_ works in very basic quantifiable tasks.

Pros

Large Company in their shosen sectors

Cons

Non aggressive in most of the markets

Advice to Senior Management

Make it aggressive

Pros

Super benefits package and pay is top end. Work was rewarding. World wide company that encourages lateral or upward movement. I also like how the company enocurages and rewards the pursuit of education and certifications -- they will pay for most job related education.

Cons

Downside was constant re-organization that made me feel a bit unsecure on job security. Also the nature of IT / Customer support i did was unpredicatable on how long a contract would last and would it be renewed. So in my mind job security at the location was not stable.

Advice to Senior Management

Continue to look for in the work force, encourage, and groom future managers. Most of my co-workers who were qualified to move up into Management were not interested, though I think they were the type of person who I would want to work for and that they would be a great manager.

Pros

Struggling; ok there was lots of elearning available to fill in the time between doing meaningful assignments which you had to find yourself

Cons

Joined as a new hire. Heard rumours of a bench, but checked and told not so made the jump. Then went thru 3 managers in six months (my initial manager left, the next one never even called me, the last was a lifer). No support for expenses for networking, left to find own work, then finally had to fill in stupid forms to show how many times a day I had tried to find an assignment. I know four people who joined for the big bucks but left within 12 months. Methodology stuck in the 80's.

Advice to Senior Management

Dont ignore new hires outside of the M4 corridor. Never had such poor management. Seemd to be the view that I could just sort myself out and my lob wouldnt even part fund my spending time on accounts foc to network

Pros

Stable environment, talented staff, colloborative approach. New focus on sales and innovation is good.

Cons

Trying to cut through corporate bureacracy. Finding the right path for professional development.

Advice to Senior Management

Continbue what you are doing; heading in the right direction.

Pros

Flexible working arrangements - quite a few people are able to work from home from time to time.
Good staff mobility - People are generally above to move around in CSC to do a variety of roles but mainly through informal networks
Varied clients - Ability to work with a variety of cliets and roles is a plus

Cons

Pay differences - sometime there are huge pay differences between people doing similar jobs with similar level of skill and experience.

Advice to Senior Management

Encourage and reward innovation. Encourage more interaction between staff working on different accounts/projects to aid networking and idea generation

Pros

CSC provides stability and job security with a reasonable pay and benefits package. If you drive your own career and set your own terms for roles it is possible to havea good work life balance and CSC are very supportive of home based working in the Project management space.

Cons

Poor pay increases year on year - The only way to really get a pay increase is to get an offer from another company and use that to push for more cash in CSC.
  If you're happy with turning the handle then CSC is OK, but if you want to push the boundaries and be inspired it's not for you

Advice to Senior Management

Get out of the server room and into the boardroon - Overall, CSC is not an innovative business enabling company, we are a tin provider. There are a few limited examples of innovation in CSC, which we do a good job of bigging up, but our bread and butter is in tin. We're reliable and trusted, which is great during a recession as companies look for low risk in their IT partners. However, as we push out of the recession we need to look to innovation, and inspiring technical solutions. If wa can't partner in the business strategy space, as companies look to take on higher risk then we will be left behind..

Pros

Solid performance at providing managed services to large corporations with mature processes and organisation structure for supporting existing and new clients. Lots of opportunity to experience different roles and industry sectors.

Cons

Communications and processes internally can be fluid leading to lost sheep feeling and going with the flow. Strategic direction of the company not always clear when moving into new markets.

Advice to Senior Management

Listen to the teams on the ground. Understand the direction the organisation needs to be in and free up resources to mature the offerings and promote the organisation to a wider client community.

Pros

1. Fairly easy to change roles internally
2. Internal career opportunities communicated regularly
3. Trying to change it's culture, moving away from being a siloed, account centric organisation.
4. Opportunities to take on extra responsiblities/roles for those who are willing
5. Good training opportunities

Cons

1. See point 4. of Pros, also a con because you might not necessarily receive rewards/recognition for the extra work you do.
2. Run by a bunch of accountants i.e. tight when it comes to equipment/expenses, some people have had the same laptop for 5 years+, you have write to a business case for just about any request.
3. See 5. of Pros, you tend to need this training to be funded by a project, otherwise forget it.
4. Big organisation, too easy to become "forgotten".

Advice to Senior Management

Although things are beggining to change, the appraisal/promotion process must be more transparant. Better recognition for those working above and beyond their current roles.