Dell Reviews in Austin, TX Area

Pros

Customer is number 1, and people are nice to work with. They are flexible with your work schedule, but then give you 60 hours of work to make up for the flexibility.

Cons

Customer is number 1, but so is money number one and so is perception number 1. which causes one to question what he should do, because no matter what, it can percieved as bad for the company.

Advice to Senior Management

Stop sending directives that contradict one another. You say you want feedback, but reject 98% of it and make your own decisions. You want the customer to be #1, but in my realm, the Cost to make the customer number 1 is way too costly, therefore we have to deny our customers their paid service sla's to save a few bucks.

Pros

Major organization impacting decisions are made quickly and often for a large corporation. This makes for a fast paced and challenging work environment.

Cons

The fast pace and challenging work comes with a price. Worklife inbalance, frequent organization changes, and high pressure deadlines, bordering on unrealistic, are the norm. Manager/Director roles at Dell are not "cush" jobs. They are expected to know and work in the details, while also leading and managing the frequent changes. Workload is very heavy.

Advice to Senior Management

Need to keep the employee value proposition in mind when thinking of the team members. Why is it worth working so hard and making personal sacrifices? If it's "To Keep Your Job", then retention and engagement will continue to suffer.

Pros

Personal development tools and work environment.

Cons

Many organizational changes in a very short time.

Advice to Senior Management

More 1on1 and feedback.

Pros

flexibility
day hrs of operations

Cons

growth
visibility in the management

Advice to Senior Management

lower level of hierarchy in the divisions. control on head count under a director

Pros

Great flexible worksapce and family environment
A tremendous focus on personal growth and success

Cons

limted voice interms of sales projections, top down communocations are very limited as well
company's onboard process was not very complete

Advice to Senior Management

Keep driving forward

Pros

A fast paced environment and working with some interesting technology and fairly smart people. The pay is okay, although they tout it as above average - in reality they keep taking things away and reducing them (remember employee stock purchase?).

Cons

Since joining Dell a few years ago I have become accustomed to terms like 'throat to choke' (which apparently is what the DM role is) and 'feeding frenzy' which is applied to a status meeting when the execs smell some blood, they do not try to help, instead they try to make the wound worse and expose your issue to the broader team. Sometimes it is deserved, which helps you strengthen your message, but also causes presenters to not discuss some of the issues. That generally works, since your team is smart and can overcome the problem, but sometimes it would help to have upper management support and not attacks. Maybe other environments are like this, but certainly not what I have experienced. This goes back to the cut-throat nature of employee reviews and how people make strategic moves to boost their career at the expense of others.
The team is also wondering when the ball will drop and everything goes to China/India. I think the languishing stock price matches the company's prospects.

Advice to Senior Management

Help, not hinder, product development. You talk a game of teamwork, but a lot of the time seems to be positioning and trying to prove you still have engineering skills.

Pros

Work Life Effectiveness
Work for home - time off when needed without question
Rewards
Career Development
Advancement
Work with incredibly smart people
Positive work environment

Cons

Getting very big and harder to navigate.
Significant amount of change.

Advice to Senior Management

Continue to take risks that you know will help Dell grow profitably.
Continue to listen and bring in compelling thought leaders.
Continue to acquire companies that will help Dell be competitive in the solutions marketplace.

Pros

Opportunities to take on new projects

Cons

Low pay, mediocre management, unusual job performance assessments.

Advice to Senior Management

Bring in leaders, not just managers

Pros

Access to working on large projects that impact many people. Travel is great when available. Great passion for winning.

Cons

Little credit for great work or innovation. Almost all innovation is through acquisitions. Internals groups have opposing goals. Employees know if they're on or off 'promotion list.'

Advice to Senior Management

Encourage more movement throughout the organization. Stop having people sit in the same position too long.

Pros

smart coworkers, professional management, performance driven. very professionally run organization and global dynamic in a balanced centralized-decentralized model encouraged great global work.

Cons

no tolerance for partial achievement, rigorous process, overly bureaucratic at times, short threshold for new start-up business ventures that often short circuited promising areas of potential revenue expansion