Hcsc Reviews

Pros

Great benefits
First level managers are very understanding
Reasonable pay for new & experienced employees
Plenty of available PTO days
Family atomsphere (somewhat)

Cons

Virtually every man/woman in a leadership position in Texas comes from Illinois
Longevity carries too much weight
Butt-kissing seems to get you further than simply being the most effective worker

Advice to Senior Management

I work in an area where there are three separate departments on the same floor. One area is extremely diverse and almost completely female. The second area has a good mixture of men/women of various races and the third area is comprised of mostly males of the majority race (this is the case in both Chicago and Richardson). The problem is that the people in leadership positions are mostly drawn from the last department. Walking through the HCSC building, you see tremendous diversity but the top of the organizational chart doesn't reflect that....though I will say that the company has far more females in top positions than most other companies (great for us ladies).

The worker bees (most of them) and the lower level, front-line managers are excellent. The problem is that there are far too many layers and bureaucratic red-tape.

HCSC needs to begin promoting Texas talent to managerial positions. There are far too many high quality natives for us not to have some higher level leadership grown close to home.

Pros

growth opportunities at times but can be limited

Cons

cannot trust upper and middle management
limited salary increase where you are expected to do more for the same pay

Pros

Salary is great, job security is better than most places. There are a lot of interesting people working there

Cons

Who you know is key, who you are related to is even more important. Be prepared to be shuffled around without notice; hard to keep a career on track. Professional growth opportunities are generally sparse, and what training is available tends to be second-rate by my standards.

Advice to Senior Management

Senior management is out of touch with modern organizational structure. You need to stop talking to each other and get in touch with your employees.

Pros

Compensation and benefits are good. Work / Life balance is great in most areas - generally you can take vacation with very little notice.

Cons

Too many to list. Leadership has no clue how to operate an effective business. It's basically a gravy train for the inept lifers that have been there for 30 years.

Advice to Senior Management

Fire senior managers and directors whose claim to academic fame is a GED. Shop around for real talent - bring in some leaders from top MBA programs to shake up the place a bit. PHH is a fine CEO - I think her inner circle is full of talent, but wade into the depths of ITG or SSD and you'll be drowned by incompetence.

Pros

The benefits and pay were great.

Cons

Some hostile people who were allowed to behave in terrible ways. Throwing things, cheating at test performance in IT and no discipline in work practices.

Advice to Senior Management

You do a great job of on-boarding your new employees. You should work to retain them by providing a fair and decent work environment.

Pros

seems stable, large IT environment

Cons

old technology, outdated mind set with handling security, downtown location is a difficult commute

Pros

Pay is decent, good technology, strong financials

Cons

Very silo-ed. hard to get information and cooperation from other teams. Creates a lot of stress and confusion.

Advice to Senior Management

Recognize performance. Build team work. Let go of under-performers. Reduce layers of management.

Pros

-good benefits
-reasonable compensation
-actively pursues a diverse workforce
-previously was a good company to for

Cons

-outsourcing jobs to foreign countries
-more concerned about employee metrics on paper than actual performance and knowledge
-most middle managers more concerned about making their team look good on paper than the best ways to accomplish the work
-corporate seems unwilling to consider ideas from people actually performing the work and instead imposes unreasonable expectations while creating barriers to meeting those expectation

Advice to Senior Management

-staff actually performing the work need to be more involved in decisions that will effect how the work is done.
-middle management needs to be given more flexibility in how to manage their teams

Pros

-Given a lot of respect up and down the hierarchy if you are able to prove yourself
-Non-investor owned company that ultimately does care about its membes
-Great benefits (though medical expenses were going up and PTO was being cut back somewhat)
-Flexibility in moving across the organization to learn to gain experience in other areas.

Cons

-Some divisions still have a bit of an "old boy network/old guard" mentality and are more resistant to change and the leadership seems to mainly focus on taking care of "their inner circle".
-Communication channels seem to be broken, with Senior Leadership not always effectively communicating important information to their line managers and individual contributors.

Advice to Senior Management

Don't be afraid to open up communication channels to all levels of the organization and help them understand how their work fits into the short and long term goals of the company. Continue to open up the collaboration across business operations and break down silos.

Pros

- good pay/benefits
 - great city location
 - some great people

Cons

- very bureaucratic
 - lots of politics to deal with
 - some employees are very unintelligent but impossible to let go of

Advice to Senior Management

Don't be so nice. Get rid of the dead weight and hire more fresh/young, intelligent people. We will all be better off this way.