Pros

The people are very nice and the physical work environments are generally good, except for contractors who labor in cramped rooms. Benefits and salary are competative. Formalized training is good. There is much to be done and the company is hiring.

Cons

The IT environment is high pressure to the extreme with no regard for work life balance. Employees regularly work long hours and over weekends and holidays just to keep up with their own work. People show up sick for the same reason which spreads illness (remote work is discouraged). Collaboration tools such as NetMeeting are not used so people must walk between buildings (outside) to attend face to face meetings. This is a big time waster. Tools and processes are outdated and excessively bureaucratic.

Advice to Senior Management

Take a good look at the costs incurred by lack of collaboration tools. Substantially trim and improve the SDLC and PMLC processes so that they are manageable for users to learn and utilize. Understand that working people to death leads to a lot of corner-cutting, poor decisions, hiding of issues, and mismanaged efforts. You reap what you sow.

Pros

Salary and possible signing bonus (now I know why they thew a lot of money at me). People in many parts of the organization are truly dedicated to the mission, many long timers.

Cons

First level managers are geared towards being individual contributors first and then managing their direct reports is far down the list. This may be all well and good as it means you will be self-managed, but given the complexity of the organization (communication, technology, processes/procedures, politics, etc.) it could make your first months or year very, very difficult. Big picture - the future of the GSE's is anything but stable as only the Gods know what the future holds for Fannie and Freddie...weigh the risks.

Advice to Senior Management

Do not promote individuals to managers if they're better suited to being indivdual contributors, structure the departments/divisions accordingly so these people can advance w/o becoming a "manager".

Pros

Great benefits
On site gym and doctor
nice, bright people

Cons

Pay for performance doesn't work
Little chance for promotion due to assessment structure
Negative public image
Not stable

Advice to Senior Management

New CEO seems to be very positive. He communicates regularly with staff-- encouraging

Pros

Freddie Mac has great benefits. At the headquarters, there are 2 gyms on site, as well as a multipurpose court outside, where they always have activities for you to participate in.

Cons

Environment is stressful because nobody knows who will show up tomorrow and who won't. Turnover is out of control with management and fellow employees.

Advice to Senior Management

Encourage training for employees to better themselves for the sake of doing their job more effectively and efficiently. Interact with employees to see how they feel about their job security, as well as career growth.

Pros

The work is interesting and challenging (as least in most parts of the company) and the employee benefits are well above average, especially for long-tenured employees, of which I'm one. There does seem to be a certain type of person - mostly a politically savvy corporate type - who thrives at Freddie.

Cons

While conservatorship has led to new challenges, it has also slowed down processes at an already bureaucratic company. More important than that is the uncertain future of the company.

Advice to Senior Management

Stick around for a while. Some stability in the senior management ranks is very much needed to maintain - and potentially improve - employee morale!

Pros

-Can learn a lot in a very short period of time
-Ideal for entry-level employees
-Good benefits
-some positions give you Wall Street exposure

Cons

-Hard to get reassigned, you most likely will be laid off when management veers off (again); this results in an impaired institutional memory
-Narrow job silos make you much less marketable to outside employers
-Never having been properly capitalized in the first place and its conflicting missions make it a political pinata, hence the management veering
-Executive suite always in turmoil due to the pinata effect, no cooperation between divisions as a result

Advice to Senior Management

Try to hang on to your talent.

Pros

Good job location. Some smart people that you can really learn from. A great place to start if you are in the mortgages industry.

Cons

Not sure when the downward spiral will end. Maybe until the government goes out and stops the meddling of affairs.

Advice to Senior Management

Strike the balance between satisfying the government and really making money for the company. Find a way to retain all the talents.

Pros

Great benefits and 401K
A bunch of divisions that do different things (finance, acctg, IT, investments, fraud, defaults, etc)
Good starting salaries
Perks (internet surfing, TVs, gyms, vending machines, Starbucks, dry cleaning, catered parties)
Jean Friday
Town halls where employees can ask CEOs/CFOs/etc. questions in person.
Six Flags family day (cancelled last year due to all the media hooplah)
The mission: make home possible and affordable for as many families as possible
Community invovlement (especially Habitat for Humanity and Wednesday's Child)

Cons

Too many pointless managers (the happiest analysts are those that report straight to a director, and the happiest directors are those who directly manage their anaylsts; the unhappy people have middle managers to go through)
Very hard to get internal transfers
Management won't tell us about the company's future (I'm sure they know at least something)
Expected to work 60+ hours a week with no overtime. Expected to work weekends every now and then (if I have to be at work during senior management's hours, then give me a senior management type of salary. Otherwise, what's the point?).
Many groups frown on letting employees telecommute or work from home on their laptops. Why do we have them then?
End up doing the same job/tasks for years. Management is poor at helping employees grow professionally.
The accounting controls environment is insane. What's the point of auditing a department, having an internal review, having an internal audit, and having an external audit - each quarter? It takes more time to go over the controls of a task than it does to do the actual task.
Managers call too many pointless meetings just to make themselves seem busy and feel important.

Advice to Senior Management

Get rid of 30% of the managers. Get rid of 10% of the directors. Make the media rounds and explain what we do so that our friends and family members will stop asking us "What's going on over there at Freddie Mac?" Cut out some of the controls on old tasks and focus on developing new strategies with simple controls around those. Hire more from within the company so employees are better able to move around. Tell managers to stop calling so many meetings each day. They sit in the same aisle as us; they can just walk 5 steps to our cube and say what they have to say. Let us use our laptops at home so we don't have to do a pointless 1 hour commute on non-busy days. Pay overtime or let us leave on time.

FYI - David Moffett is not the CEO anymore. Hasn't been for a year. He quit on us.

Pros

Great benefits (health, new home buyers, etc.)
Compensation is competitive
Lax company culture / dress code
Existence of New Hire "class" and comradery (lots of events social and otherwise done together)
Many young professionals between the interns and new college hires
New College Hire IT Rotation - samlpe different IT work before landing somehwere
Gym in most buildings (also volleyball/basketball intramurals and leagues)
Very diverse workplace (culturally, agewise, background, etc.)

Cons

Big company, moves slow
Future uncertain
Generally low moral (among interns and college hires I spoke to)
I felt like I would be doing the SAME work years down the road (hard to move around)

Advice to Senior Management

Be more transparent about thewhat you will actually be doing when you're hired.

Pros

Extremely talent staff (many former mgmt consulting and Wall Street), challenging problems, and pleasant environment

Cons

Politically charged environment, but new management may break these habits

Advice to Senior Management

Nothing they don't already know...