First Data Reviews

Pros

Varying Work.
Some nice people.
Flecibility in working.

Cons

People work in Silos.
Too many organisational Changes.
Drastic cut backs.
No pay rises.
Old employees set in their ways.
No proper project support from resources.
No future.

Advice to Senior Management

Get rid of people who don't work.
Pay attention to those that do.
Improve remuneration.
Stop this indefinate streamlining....

Pros

People that I worked with everyday were fantastic! Great system and tools, usually had what you needed. Knowledge share was great between teams. last few years some things have been cut but still you will get all you need to get things done.

Cons

Upper Management keeps pushing jobs offshore. The workload on managers and Tech Leads is getting very high. Some offshore developers are great some not so great, most OK and try hard but are not really up on how the products work or what customers and clients expect. Seems like once the offshore contractors get experience they move on and are replaced with "freshers", India slang for new programmers fresh out of school.

Advice to Senior Management

Need more balance of offshore and onshore IT people. Need to work to keep your knowledge base. FDR system cannot be learned in 3 days of presentations.

Pros

Good people, treated fairly, reasonable work-life balance

Cons

Little upward mobility below SVP level, capital structure inhibits growth upside

Pros

The company has very good benefits and the pay is about the norm for the area and type of job.

Cons

To many layoffs, knowledge and amount of time dedicated to this company do not matter any more, all that matters now is that senior management makes more money. The company often lays off the people that actually do the work instead of the higher ups, and there are way to many of them, that sit in offices all day long, when they come to the office, and stay on conference calls all day. Dedication means nothing to his company.

Advice to Senior Management

Stop getting rid of the people that made this company what they are, stop getting rid of the hard working people that keep this company afloat.

Pros

Health benefits were very good.

Cons

Exec Mgmt is all about taking the company public again. Forget about profits if you are not exec mgmt.

Advice to Senior Management

Share the profits with the people that do the true work

Pros

Flexibility.
Decent industry.
seems like a new focus on employees....we will see.

Cons

Old boys network.
Not what you know, who you know.
Everyone is a VP! Very top heavy.

Advice to Senior Management

Pay those at the bottom fairly.

Pros

The compensation was good, but there were minimal reviews for advancement

Cons

Poor ownership with very little communication amongst mangment and departments

Pros

- The payments processing industry is extremely relevant and interesting, and FDC is engaged in virtually every facet of it. You can learn a lot if motivated to do so.
- Compensation was simply excellent in terms of salary, bonus, equity participation
- Very good flexibility in terms of remote work flexibility
- Dedicated and knowledgeable staff
- Witnessed earnest efforts at innovation during my tenure

Cons

- Likely the most bureaucratic organization I have ever worked in, and that includes several Fortune 500 organizations. If you don't like conforming to detailed regulations/processes that affect almost every facet of your work, this may not be the place for you.
- Very siloed, business unit-driven organization
- Turnover of senior management positions is high, such as in every 2-3 years.
- While it resisted it for a long time, offshoring and commoditization of staff was taking hold when I left.

Advice to Senior Management

- Break down the silos, ala the One Company mandate that existed at one point
- Focus on retention of key people
- Exercise care in offshoring initiatives which displace veteran staff with excellent domain knowledge

Pros

Challenging work and exposure to large / highly critical system.

Cons

Work Pressure grows with financial impact.

Pros

Interesting work, decent pay, dedicated workforce.

Cons

Very political and inward focused. Management by proxy.

Advice to Senior Management

Communicate, communicate, communicate. Let clients lead their own companies.