Cisco Systems Reviews in Research Triangle Park, NC

Pros

Market leader always pursuing innovation
Smart people
Opportunity to grow and experience many facets of the organization....no pigeon holing
Flexibility in work arrangements... Telecommuting
Cutting edge productivity tools and technology made available to all employees
Fast paced and broad scope of responsibilities

Cons

Average to lower comp than peer companies
Very large organization....pockets of deep bureaucracy
Takes time to establish connections to navigate politics

Pros

Work from home options are prevalent in many teams, and are a great benefit. There is a culture of "work-life" balance, and most (but not all) managers recognize that. It's a fast-paced and sometimes fun place to work, again, in the right team and under the right manager.

Cons

Is hard to know "how" to get to the next level for promotion or pay raise. The goal you are given is to "perform at the next level so that you can be promoted there", but then, there is no definition of what that next level is.

Advice to Senior Management

Define job responsibilities and give a clear path for advancement to employees.

Pros

Pay and benefits. Flexible work options. Most of the folk want to have a team environment, but the polarization of management and a select few seem to limit a climb in moral.

Cons

Disconnect between management and non management employments. The politics in the company is disturbing and fosters a feeling of being treated beneath others.

Advice to Senior Management

Maybe you're going about this all wrong in terms of how you build your management staff. If you allow managers to only surround themselves with people who think just like they do, indirectly the company is stunted exponentially, because you're breeding segregation, and killing moral. John, Please please change this.

Pros

It used to be a good place to work. Experience looks good on a resume. ESSP was a great deal.
Severance is good, when they offshore you.

Cons

In Cali, India or China it is probably an ok job. In RTP, you can be in sales or support and possibly have a future. If you are a Sr. developer in RTP, your future is limited. When you start teaching offshore replacements, be worried. Don't be surprised if you work night and weekends, have great performance reviews, and then are thrown out like old socks.

Advice to Senior Management

If your goal is to get rid of your best, brightest, hardest working staff, and breaking up teams that work great together, then you are going an A+ job.

Pros

I have been contracting with Cisco (under 3 different bosses) for over one year. They never want to pay overtime. Pros: There is a lot of work.

Cons

There is too much work --- on average 10- 12 hours per day w/o OT.

Advice to Senior Management

Pay Cisco contractors without any hassle.

Pros

Very competent workforce. Benefits are ok, salaries are low, but when bonus is added, then it is
close to the industry average.
Work life balances is preached about, but seldom practised. But depends on the BU/team you are
a part of.
You can anonymously interview with other teams when you are ready to move. But never trust any
of the internal career websites, since clicking buttons can rock the boat by a tip off to the present
reporting chain.
There is $30 billion cash, but they cut employee amneties like free soda etc.
Good employees are continuing to leave.

Cons

Benefits are ok, salaries are low, but when bonus is added, then it is
close to industry average. Absolutely ZERO career progression opportunity if you are located outside of San Jose. Cisco does a good job of lipservice about promoting other sites, but the executives are total snobs. They want all their reports to be local in SJ, regardless of costs and attrition rates. Poor performing execs get promoted and moved up. When your run rate is over $1B, why rock the boat with new R&D and increasing your bottom line? Status quo is great. Brown nosing works well. Many a managers and Directors are jerks and should not have been put in leadership roles to begin with. Now the senior execs are flattening the organization, meaning absolutely no career path if one plans to move from say engineering to management.

Advice to Senior Management

Take risks.
Don't bring consulting firms when you have managers hired for the same jobs. Why are they
all here.?
Offer employees a career path. The performance reviews are a sham.
Internal movement should be made relatively easy, but the job descriptions are
 so tight that not even internal candidates will qualify. May be these are "green card" job postings.

Pros

Flexibility, good people, fair compensation and benefits

Cons

Top heavy, process heavy, too many people to show how to put on the bulb, few doers and less credibility for the doers.

Slow decision making

Off-shoring of IT functions has in fact increased costs (as onsite resources are required anyways), quality has suffered, and delays and failure in delivery of IT projects.

Advice to Senior Management

In IT: Back to the Basics in true sense- dont need Accenture to be doing Administrative work, very expensive. Reduce count of IT Analysts and PMs, focus on increasing core techno-functional resources and simplify process.

Recent changes are good, but some more top trimming would have been good.

Pros

Good Company,
Large,
Competitive,
Broad portfolio to sel

Cons

At times too large
Upward mobility somewhat hindered with ridiculous HR people/rules

Advice to Senior Management

Realize that sales keeps the lights on, i realize this is an IT company and run by a bunch of techies, but no sales, no light, no compay - make iteasier for us to sell

Pros

- Flexible work hours and work from home as needed
- Great work environment (facilities & equipment)
- Great benefits & pay

Cons

- Perks were cut back in 2008/2009
- Politics. Poor managers can succeed by managing upwards and making life miserable for the people under them.
- Performance reviews: Team members are ranked, so even a team with all good staff someone gets a poor review and no bonus.

Advice to Senior Management

Penalize managers who get bad Pulse survey results year after year to get rid of bad managers. After my teams last Pulse survey results, the director said there were no surprises with the results yet one of his managers under him was rated as ineffective by 80% of his staff! That's not a surprise? You're proud of it? This manager has had a 66% turnover in 18 months since he joined the team where the previous manager had great team morale for 3+ yrs and only team growth instead of turnover.

Pros

results oriented culture
work life balance
good compensation
smart, driven people
lots of resources for sales and business development to get their job done

Cons

too many cogs in the sales machine
need greater accountability by senior leadership
lack of focus
new focus = same old thing

Advice to Senior Management

management needs to stop talking about solutions and start implementing simplified go-to-market modes that provide an incentive for sales to sell things outside their comfort zone