Fallon Community Health Plan Reviews

Pros

Friendly helpful co workers
Great location and free parking
Things like casual Friday's and barbecues etc to keep people happy

Cons

Produce, Produce, Produce
No feedback about job productivity
Insurance companies don't offer the best pay
They could use some more perks

Advice to Senior Management

When people ask for the truth they can usually handle it so give it to them and stop sugar coating everything.

Pros

For a long time Fallon treated employees like family. The salary, work conditions and benefits were good, and everyone felt the company was treating them fairly. The coworkers are great and the company actively supports community service and donations to charitable causes.

Cons

Things have changed dramatically in the past year. The company is understaffed, and forced overtime and 70 hour workweeks are common. Vacation days and weekends are not respected.

Unless you have another offer in hand, promotions and bonuses are out of the question. Training is also discourage; one IT person told me it had been over 5 years since the company sent them to a training seminar.

Fallon recently cut their 401k contribution, and they raised the deductible on their health plan. My salary seems to be about 10% below what other companies are offering, but that may just be because raises have been tiny. There is a great deal of talent flight, and most of the director-level management seems to be actively searching for new jobs.

Stress levels have gotten very high. Senior management frequently uses artificial deadlines to encourage hard work. There was one time when I worked all weekend to complete a report which was then ignored for five weeks. The building also contributes to the high stress level. In the winter it's always freezing and in the summer it's always humid. The company did a terrible job assigning cubicles. For example, the medical economics department (people who need quiet in order to think about complex problems) is located right next to the insanely noisy customer service call center.

Turnover is very high, especially among highly skill workers. Middle management is pretty bad, especially in the sales and marketing departments.

Advice to Senior Management

Fallon is a community health plan; it will never be able to compete with Blue Cross or the national carriers. Remember that employees are a key stakeholder, and mistreating employees in order to slightly improve the company's profitably will cost the company in the long run.

Pros

1) Affable co-workers
2) Convenient location
3) Competitive Pay

Cons

1) There aren't enough resources given the amount of work they expect done. Highly unrealistic expectations from management, who often seem out of touch with the day to day operation of the company.

2) It varies slightly by department, but there is little to no work/life balance. Overtime is the norm, which is good for compensation, but not so good for long-term health or sanity.

3) Processes in place are generally one of two extremes - they're either non-existent in a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants way or overly-convoluted to point where it prevents anything from getting accomplished.

Advice to Senior Management

Survey your employees, and actually listen to the feedback. They have a lot to say if you're willing to listen.

Pros

Very good coworkers, can be flexible in terms of working from home(depends upon respective manager)

Cons

Complete mismanagement of all resources, can only climb the ladder if you are in the inner circle.
Management makes one bad decision followed by an even worse decision.

Advice to Senior Management

Leadership needs to get rid incompetent managers, need to hire and promote people because of their proven track record and not based on friendship

Pros

FCHP is an organization that cares for its members and employees. There is an atmosphere of family and teamwork. The senior leadership is very personable and conveys a clear message as to the goals of the organization.

Cons

I am sure that every manager has a different work style. The organization does not take into consideration an employees longtime loyatly and dedication when personal crisis' arise, even though the employee has complied with all of the managers and human resources requests and recomendations.

Advice to Senior Management

Be more understanding to longtime, faithful employees. Every individuals situation is different and an employees dedication and loyalty to the companys mission and values should count for something.

Pros

there is a substantial amount of time off available to the providers, which is increasingly rare for most positions. flexible holidays. support staff in one location is wonderful.

Cons

too many patients to see in a day. limited support staff in other work location. since the vacation time is generous, the pay tends to be less.

Advice to Senior Management

Increasing pay and reducing the number a patients required for the provider to see, train support staff more.

Pros

The employees are good souls, helpful, smart, supportive and very (even over) qualified for their jobs. You can count on fellow employees and middle management both to do the right thing, treat you well and perform high quality work. The leader of the company also seems to care about the right things and is involved in constantly making the company a better place to work. Pay is decent though not outstanding, but it is boosted by an in house bonus system and good matching on the 401k and good benefits. All in all - very nice place to work.

Cons

The VPs / Senior management seem to be a bit out of touch with, well, everything. Additionally, whatever their worth to the company is supposed to be - it's unseeable from the employee level. Budget management seems to be a particular problem for them, and many of the actions we see (such as giving an employee an office then taking it away immediately) or hear (one was quoted directly as saying "they don't care about the employees, they just want them to keep their heads down and be quiet" ) are probably out of context but but paint an uncomfortably ugly picture. I can't say what the true picture is - but the image is very negative and we don't see much to contradict it.

Advice to Senior Management

Work on their project management and communication skills, work on their image within the company. Communicate with those below them with more than just (seemingly) arbitrary commands and expectations. Value their employee's and managers more (or they'll end up losing them.) The CEO is more approachable and more caring and involved with the employees of the company than the Senior Management is...
I know a lot of the senior management is new (as the company grows it needs more VPs I guess) - but the company's growth shouldn't eliminate the good aspects it had - like the employees knowing and caring about those they work with, and the current set up actually seems to be moving backward... building ill will rather than loyalty to the new higher ups.