DeVry Reviews

Pros

-Solid Company
-Professional
-Great employees to work with

Cons

-Pressure Cooker/ numbers based***use to fire if quotas weren't met...Recently changed due to new federal laws
-Lack of transparency from upper management
-Late nights and every other weekend required, so no work/home life balance
-Advancement is mostly based on who you know, and likability
-Disconnect between middle and upper management-seemingly purposefully to keep upper in the dark
-Not many opportunities or options for advancement, so because of this you feel "stuck"
-Repetitive, repetitive, repetitive
-Your told you leads are warm, however it's basically cold calling, seeing that most don't remember asking for information. Or maybe wanted mailed info vs. a call

Advice to Senior Management

-Offer more transparency
-Management stop gossiping about your advisors and using them for info on others
-Stop the popularity contests and promote based on merit

Pros

Good Benefits. Good opportunities to learn.

Cons

1. 60-80 hour expected work weeks in IT.
2. Little appreciation for "extra" work as 60-80 hours becomes expected
3. No prioritization process as everything has to be done.
4. Lack of management support
5. Toxic talking behind people's back environment to promote individual's and individual's agenda.
6. High continuous turnover.

Advice to Senior Management

you will get what you sow. I'd encourage some solid management development philosophies on people management and team building. Managing by fear is not an endearing philosophy and can not be sustained.

Pros

Flexible with time off
Good Benefits

Cons

Huge lack of communication
Lack of serious career advancement
Laughable management practices
Quantity over quality
Department bias

Advice to Senior Management

Communication, communication, and communication

Pros

Had some really great co-workers.

Cons

Myself and my past co-workers literally celebrated the day they were fired or finally landed a new job with another company. We all came from the Online division as admissions advisors. It’s the type of sales job you would get as your 1st sales job out of college. You soon find out just how conniving their recruitment practices are and what you have to do in order to “make a sale” rather than honestly, and truthfully recruit a prospective student into a good school with a solid education.

The way the hierarchy works around there is based on numbers, not experience. If you meet and/or exceed your numbers consistently, you’ll be moved up the sales scale whether or not you even deserve or have the experience and know-how to be a manager. Which means, management is downright horrible because they have no idea what they’re doing. The only thing they know to do is micro-manage you and hound you over and over again about numbers and do everything they can do to get their team to meet their goal so they don’t get yelled at in management meetings. Overtime is not an option. It’s a demand and you’re not paid overtime for it as you’re a salary paid employee. If you don’t work on the weekends, you’re blacklisted and sent nasty emails from managers about how disappointed they are that you didn’t come in. It’s not a 40 hr work week, it’s more like 60-70. So again, it’s good for those fresh out of college as a first job, not at all for those who have a family as you will not be spending a whole lot of time with them.

Don’t ever think about or consider approaching your manager as a manager. Discussing any personal issues is just juicy gossip for them to spread. It’s also even difficult to go to HR and make a complaint and remain anonymous.

Believe me, I’m not a disgruntled employee. While I was there, just like any employee, I had my highs and lows. Pay wasn’t the worst, and benefits were pretty standard if not below. I just needed a job and found this to work for the time being. I started in one department, decided to give admissions a try and quickly saw what the company was about and decided it was time for me to prepare my departure. I did what I had to do to get by day to day, and due to poor sales #’s was let go (which is typically the reason for all those let go as Admissions has the highest turn-over as it is a sales job).

Once you start working for a new company after working here, your eyes are opened even more in realizing just how badly DeVry runs their management and business. Their practices are NOT normal. Every co-worker I’ve spoken to that has worked there, cannot believe how wonderful and amazing life is for them now that they’re not working there, and how they can’t believe they were sucked into believing that working at DeVry, is really how corporate American is…. When it’s not at all close to it. It’s a prison.

Advice to Senior Management

Rather that simply "promoting" advisors to ADA or DA based on their numbers, if you feel a particular person would make a good ADA or DA, put them through management and confidentiality training.

Also - do not rush the hiring process. Make sure one's background check clears and they are a safe employee to have in your workplace BEFORE offering them the job. Identify thieves and pedophiles are probably not suitable to work with such sensitive information.

Pros

the instructors they hire are among the best I have seen at "For-Profit" colleges.

Cons

Being a For-Profit institution weighs too heavily on the recruitment and admissions process.

Advice to Senior Management

Be more honest in your marketing to high school students.

Pros

* Free Education at DeVry and/or Keller
* Life / Work Balance
* Good Location for suburbanites
* OK Benefits

Cons

* Power struggles between departments and personal agendas drove direction more so than what was best for the students or the company. Leadership did nothing to put a stop to the in-fighting, so the people in the trenches were having to work in this this disfunctional manner on a daily basis.
* None of the so-called TEACH values were exhibited by the people I worked with. Teamwork was horrible, lots of back-stabbing, finger-pointing and passive aggressive behaviors.
* There was absolutely no accountability, and as a manager who tried to incorporate accountability measures, I ended up losing. People who made severe mistakes and didn't deliver were shifted around and rewarded while those of us who were open and honest were punished.
* Lots of lip service paid to wanting to be an employer of choice and be on the forefront of technology, but leadership did very little to move DeVry in that direction.
* Misled about the direction I was headed career-wise. I was given a stellar review (including mention of potential promotion) and a great bonus, then 3 months later, was let go without any explanation. My supervisor never had any interim discussions with me about performance concerns. When I asked during the exit interview why I was being let go, the only thing HR would say is that it was an employee-at-will state.

Advice to Senior Management

Set clearly defined goals
Don't let unhealthy relationships between departments go on for years without intervening
The TEACH values are good ones, but unfortunately, are only on paper

Pros

Lots of open space and lighting, windows everywhere (atmosphere)
Great people

Cons

Hard to get out of office at 5pm. Right near highway and road design makes it seem like Chicago traffic if you are heading toward the highway. So commute time might be annoying.

Pros

The benefits were pretty good and my co-workers were great.

Cons

Expected you to work 80-90 hour weeks consistently with no overtime pay since you are on salary. Mandatory overtime was put into place when big projects were going on, which was all of the time. If you asked for a day off, you were often told no.

Pros

benefits are great and begin day one

Cons

low pay for mangement but not for recruiters

Advice to Senior Management

be aware of your suroundings

Pros

DeVry offers amazing benefits, great hours, room for advancement, education assistance, friendly atmosphere, accesability to upper managment and over all a great team spirit.

Cons

I really don't have many cons available, besides new policies are being put into place as of the new fiscal year and there have been issues with communication.