Dimensional Fund Advisors Reviews

Pros

Great benefits, better-than-average salary, amazing building.

Cons

Management within their Marketing & Communication department is dysfunctional. Leadership within tends to be indecisive, and many managers are micro-managers, unapproachable, and/or horrible communicators. Lots of stress constantly and many fires to put out, but mostly because of their quirky direction.

Advice to Senior Management

Let the professionals you hire do what you paid them for. Make decisions and stick to them!

Pros

Great history and story to the company. Smart employees, but bad culture. Great place to learn how to be an indexer. How to process corporate actions. Learn how to elect on proxies!

Cons

A lot of "new" MBA's that say they are all about efficient markets only because if they don't they will probably be fired. Not open to ideas that the investment world is looking at. So it leaves you specialized to the point where nobody else cares how you view the world through a DFA investment microscope. Leaves you with little transferable skills because of the specialized nature of the firm. If you can stay and somehow find a niche then awesome, but like most people who leave you will find yourself exactly where you started with few skills added. In house processes exist and nobody wants to change them because they work. However, current employees don't even know what they really do because they didn't write the poorly constructed code in VB6. It is really a shame to see the new CEO incorporate all these performance reviews and micro-manage departments. I guess he should just eliminate all VPs in general and just micro-manage all departments.

Advice to Senior Management

Concentrate on overall strategy of the firm and direction instead of trying to micro-manage other peoples departments.

Pros

good salary
good people, including mgmt. (but it is their decisions that are very suspect)

Cons

RDs sit in cubes (thanks to CEO)
CEO micro manages
questionable promotions - not even sure how these decisions are made
too much emphasis on outside, external hires (new CEO is the one making this push...)
politics are too much
mgmt. not trustworthy
many different management styles - results in an unfair and unequal assessment standards come year end

Advice to Senior Management

some view this as a sales job while others think they are PhD's and consultants - need to figure out goal of sales group (would hope it is more sales oriented)
RDs should have offices - mgmt needs to realize cubes were a mistake.

Pros

Get to work with great, smart people who work hard and know how to have fun
Collaborative environment
Generous benefits, with the exception of 401k matching

Cons

Used to have a great firm culture, but office politics has taken over with company growth
Little to no training and development for employees, which is ironic given the firm's focus and ties to academics
Poor managers - lack managerial experience and don't know what they're doing
Lack of recognition/reward for work
Promotion is based on favoritism over merit

Advice to Senior Management

Treat employees like we do our clients. Invest in your employees and we'll return the favor.
Recognize your employees' contributions to the firm, especially those in support functions who are often overlooked and underappreciated
Needs to be more transparent
Train managers

Pros

- Benefits are fairly decent (healthcare, gym reimbursement)
- Work hours aren't too bad, particularly for lower level employees
- Very talented and bright employees

Cons

- POLITICAL - company claims to try to be fair and cares, but it's really a sham. Incredibly biased evaluation of employees. If you're in the "in" crowd with your boss, you are golden. If you aren't, don't even bother expecting anything at all.
- HR is horrible. They don't do anything and the leadership at the top is SO bad. Higher up VPs take complete advantage of the system and no one will say a word to them.
- Morale is horrible. Everyone is waiting for the remaining founder to sell the company, so they can cash out and leave. The founder pulled a fast one and moved the company headquarters to Austin from Santa Monica and most people were forced to move because the economy was in shambles and they didn't have the choice. I know first hand that there will be an exodus once the company is sold and all the VPs can dump their shares.

Advice to Senior Management

- Try to treat people with some equality. The CEO has lunch with employees to supposedly learn about people and what the company could improve. Nothing gets done and it's all really for show rather than to learn things.
- Get rid of the favoritism and implement a non-biased way of evaluating people.

Pros

Good Benefits (100% paid health care premiums).
Used to have a good location.
Senoir management is smart and know what they doing.

Cons

Very hard to get recognized or promoted unless you have the right "friends"!!!!

HR is awful and afraid to resolve conflict!!

Advice to Senior Management

“overall good company but need more communication between departments & senior management and politics”

Pros

Great benefits; some smart, interesting people work within the company; great cafeteria. International locations. Company looks shiny and pretty to outsiders. Company does not waver from core values, and "stays the course" with investment philosophy even in tough economical times. CEO has lunch with employees periodically and seems to take an interest in employees. Beautiful building and comfortable (physical) environment. Pay is above average.

Cons

Extremely political, corporate culture pits departments and employees against each other. Poor communication between middle management and employees. Immature company with growing pains that hires competent (even the best) people to help grow the company, but seems completely uninterested in making things run more efficiently. No direct communication; much employee feedback is second- or third-hand information, and almost never delivered by the person having an issue with the employee (have observed this in multiple departments...seems to be related to corporate culture). Management holds onto negative information, doesn't address it in a timely fashion, and doesn't share it with responsible parties until situations have escalated and jobs are on the line. Proactive problem solving is not the norm.

Underling employees serve as a "life support system" for PhDs, "Regional Directors" and "Vice Presidents," and are treated as "expendable." Titles are a big deal, and if you don't have the "right" title, people literally won't talk to you. There are many "VPs", and there is brutal competition to attain this rank.

Communication channels are not clear, and if you overstep the secret boundaries, you'll get your hand slapped. Culture is very "cloak and dagger," with many mini-meetings that exclude people who should be included in decision making, frequently vilifying one employee who is ceremoniously sacrificed in order to appease management. It's completely acceptable to walk all over others and destroy their careers in order to advance within the company, and it's impossible to know who to trust. With little turnover in the long-term employees, there are many secret political connections which are impossible to navigate while remaining productive and upbeat. Many employees feel a great sense of job insecurity and walking on eggshells with little positive feedback.

Some PhDs are incapable of accepting feedback, suggestions, and the work of non-PhDs, targeting the non-PhDs for termination if they make suggestions that cast the PhD as anything but the expert. When things go wrong, an employee is targeted and blamed for things they may not have even been involved in. Corporate culture feels like an episode of "The Apprentice" or "Survivor," with employees being voted "off the island" by others who are completely unaware of an individual employee's day-to-day performance.

I saw another review which cited "team culture" with long-term employees, and I did not find that to be the case at all...even when there is a sense of team within a workgroup, I have seen management intervene and disparage a member of the group, turning others against them and destroying the cohesiveness of the team. I have worked for larger, well-established companies in the past, and I have NEVER seen this.

Also, your educational credentials must be "pretty." Some of my colleagues cited feeling like second-class citizens because they didn't get their degree, MBA, or other advanced degree from the "right" university. Dimensional is very big on outward appearances.

HR claims to have an open-door policy, but the political environment means you're putting your neck on the chopping block if you try to give feedback. Many employees cite not being able to trust HR in employee relations issues (they are great with benefits, though). Semi-annual review process is easily manipulated and completely ineffective, and allows for personal bias on the part of the supervisor or manager.

Advice to Senior Management

Need to encourage better communication within company. Need to have a mechanism for employees to rate immediate supervisors and management. Need to seriously address the political climate and an environment that allows backstabbing for personal gain. Need to recognize the efforts of the "life support system" that makes the company actually run...not give all of the glory to the people with the "right" titles. Management should seek feedback from all levels of the company before making big decisions, and when accusations are made by a department against another department, management should have open discussions with ALL levels of the "offending" department. Management needs to stop protecting employees who have been there for a long time and who have become inefficient. Management should solicit feedback from newer employees who have good experience with other companies, and welcome those ideas in order to help the company grow more efficiently and effectively...perhaps a focus group setting after an employee has been there six months. The review process needs complete overhaul, with mechanism for allowing the employee the opportunity to provide open and honest feedback on their job, issues within the department, and management without fear of losing job or retaliation. The climate of fear is hindering honest and open communication that could make Dimensional even more successful.

Pros

The pay is great since they were moved from California but still pay those salaries, the benefits are great as well, most people very passionate about work, can move up if you work hard enough

Cons

Poor employee attitudes toward each other, jobs are tiered and can only move up if you meet every single requirement

Advice to Senior Management

Treat employees with more respect and listen to their feedback, or just ask for employee feedback, a less intense work environment.

Pros

Senior people are brilliant and great to work with and learn from.
Many of the longer employed people understand the sense of team culture.
Team-oriented environment is clearly recognizable

Cons

Poor communication between Senior Mgmt and the departments about company's direction.
Buddy-system politics in some departments when it comes to promotions.
Poor IT infrastructure -- too many hurdles to get things done quickly.

Advice to Senior Management

Please start asking the entry-level employees what they see issues at the firm are from the bottom up, their thoughts on big projects.

Pros

One of the few companies that will still give a lunch allowance in Mayfair, fairly attractive pay for new associates, academic approach to investing that is rooted in Nobel prize winning financial theory, investment performance is a non-issue given the nature of its investment philosophy.

Cons

Little prospect for growth for analysts and associates, poor management in place due to the homogenous backgrounds of senior management, very pro-chicago university oriented. Not particularly in culture, and very conservative. Dont expect to get what you see. Being a model-based fund, work is mostly operational. Legacy systems are archaic and inefficient. Still has a long way to go to develop its infrastucture.

Advice to Senior Management

Favouritism to Chicago U graduates can be disincentivising. Empower your junior staff, or don't expect any of them to remain when the economy rebounds.