Countrywide Financial Reviews in Dallas-Fort Worth, TX Area

Pros

Location, Salary, People, on site cafeteria

Cons

Less opportunity for advancement than other companies

Advice to Senior Management

thanks for not being micro managers

Pros

The only reason I would ever want to work at Countrywide again would be the fact that they got bought out by Bank of America. The company name "Bank of America" would be a good stepping stone for people to move into smaller companies with better pay.

Cons

I could go on forever about how terrible this place was. The managers never had any work to do, yet they tried to act like they were really busy. The same went for most of the employees here. We were given lots of "drive around the parking lot" work. I felt like I was becoming dumber every day I went in. The work that we were given was hardly ever challenging. The salary and bonuses were also terrible. I would avoid this place at all costs. Bank of America made a dumb move in acquiring this run down company.

Advice to Senior Management

Cut down the number of VPs and SVPs you have in the company. A 3 to 1 employee to manager ratio is just ridiculous.

Pros

great advancement opportunites and compensation, very collegial workforce, a number of long term employees, pride in the company, growing fast

Cons

very fast paced, never enough staff to do the work needed, seems as if all communications, programs etc were focused on the LCD (i.e. lowest common denominator) employees, short cubicle walls

Advice to Senior Management

to many levels of VPS

Pros

Countrywide is a good place to work because you are working for a large financial firm where many different opportunities for growth are available. This company encourages moving into different positions in various departments throughout your career at the company. Having this experience in different fields make an individual more valuable, as you acquire many different skillsets, which always looks good on a resume. You are able to achieve this all while staying under the umbrella of Countrywide and maintaining job stability.

Cons

Countrywide can be an extremely disorganized organization. One of the favorite sayings is that if you don't understand a policy or procedure and ask 10 different people, you will get 10 different answers.

Advice to Senior Management

To treat everybody fairly and equally.

Pros

The company offers a lot of trianing classes so that employees can broaden their skills and their knowledge. The overall environment is good and the people who work within the company are overall friendly.

Cons

There is a lack of career growth and nothing is defined on how you can grow your career or move forward in the business. Career paths overall are very vague. There is also little to no recognition for your hard work. Customer service seems to have good recognition but all other departments are highly lacking. You have to be willing to work very hard with no one seeming to notice.

Advice to Senior Management

To keep and retain employees you need to help them grow and help them move their careers forward, you can not let them stay in the same place with no recognition. Recognizing good work enables employees to know and understand they are doing a great job. Help motivate them to strive to do their best every day and work with them to expand their carrers.

Pros

There really is not a lot of good reasons to work for Countrywide. They used to have superior health benefits but for the past several years they have been scaling back and requiring the employee's to pay more out-of-pocket. Their insurance really isn't all that good any longer. I guess the best reason to work for me to work at Countrywide was that it was 15 minutes from my house.

Cons

They are a very reactive not proactive company. Half the time is spent putting out wild fires for management rather than being productive in your job.
Management is VERY prone to take credit for employee's work, it is a very dog-eat-dog environment. I have also seen that the abvility to move up in the company is somewhat based on how well the employee can "kiss up" and not based on knowledge or hard work.
Countrywide also tends to hire nonprofessional individuals which creates a nonprofessional atmosphere.

Advice to Senior Management

Having had the opportunity to work in three separate division during my career at Countrywide, I found that Senior Management is not involved enough with the work that is really going on. They are more concerned with covering mistakes they've made and having everyone work around the clock for insignificant reasons. With these inefficiencies, it causes more critical errors that has been in the long run the demise of Countrywide Financial Corp.

Pros

Work/life balance in the position I was in, the corporate offices were generally in nice areas and suburbs, commute times reasonable, nice offices

Cons

Lack of career advancement opportunities, lack of recognition of superior work, geographic separation of management and staff leads to the 'out of sight, out of mind' mentality.

Advice to Senior Management

Prepare for a culture shock with the BOA acquisition, and be open to change. Recognize that structure and organization are a good thing.

Pros

People. Most of the people you work with are the best. They are always willing to step up and pitch in to help; most of the time without being asked. They really highlight the people during the rewards ceremonies.
Location. Countrywide has many locations so you have the ability to chose what works best for you.
Flexiblity. Many of the groups are extremely flexible with the working hours as long as the work gets completed.

Cons

Inequity. Most groups within Countrywide, it is who you know to get promoted. Many of the people receive their promotions like "merit" raises. Unfortunately, there are a few managers that try to promote their staff truly based on ability. If you happen to be associated with the "good" boss, your career can suffer as you get left behind.
Enforcement. Process improvement is a great idea and from these ideas direction is given to individuals and groups on how to use the new technique. The downside is that no one enforces the transition to the new method. This often results in fragmented processes and one more system or application where 50% are using the old and the other move on to the new.

Advice to Senior Management

Communicate. Take time out of that busy schedule to truly talk with your staff. People just like to know "why" and feel included. If your staff believes you care about them, they will do anything for you.
Trust. Blind faith in your managers usually is not the best for the company or your staff. Some people even though they have tenure are not cut out to manage people.
Vision. Get past "the way we have always done it" and embrace the best way to do it.

Pros

relaxed environment, nice people, multi-ethnic & culture

Cons

mainly because their business is going down

Advice to Senior Management

better communication is needed in IT groups

Pros

It's a place to work for a pay check.

Cons

Unable to advance based on performance and not who you know.

Advice to Senior Management

Stop hiring family members within the same division.