Kaiser Permanente Reviews

Former Employee – worked at Kaiser Permanente

Pros – excellent compensation and benefit package. Generally high level of competence and commitment in the physician group. No reward for doing procedures or surgeries, so very few unnecessary ones. Many excellent staff...but see below for issues.
 Electronic medical records fully in place. Nice but not lavish office and hospital furnishings. I don't like hospitals that look like 5 star hotels. I don't think it makes people less ill and it is wasteful.

Cons – Unionized employees. The poorly performing ones are protected by the Union and the excellent performers have to work harder to cover for them...a huge fairness issue.

Many look at sick leave as a benefit to be taken like vacation because they have negotiated sick leave pay for the first day out, unlike other systems where sick leave doesn't engage until you have taken 1-2 days off without pay (or are paid out of your accumulated Vacation Leave)

 It is very difficult to fire an incompetent employee after a WAY too brief probation period.

Admin management is very uninspiring. The jobs and advances are given seemingly as awards to those who toe the line and the system seems very inbred. Part of this is due to the dominance of the employee unions and the discomfort of health care administrators from other systems with this.

Kaiser has the reverse situation of most competitor systems in San Diego. The physicians are for the most part compliant and under control while the staff can be surly, sulky and confrontational. It is common for patients to be treated indifferently by front desk staff. Most systems suffer from the opposite..doctors with big heads and egos that are a pain to manage and compliant staff that jump and smile when told to in order to insure that they keep their jobs.

Advice to Senior Management – Our nurses and staff are very well paid compared to the Scripps and other systems. For this we should be getting exceptional support...and we are not. The strength of the unions lies in their threats to strike if they don't get what they want. What kind of a work ethic is that ? Never mind what happened to General Motors, they would rather see the ship go down than give up their job security and cush benefits, and continue rendering crummy service to patients..putting the company at risk.

I realize Kaiser's ties to unions has also insured the loyalty of many other unions, thus insuring some of our patient base. But surely you can see how this circular argument also guarantees that many other potential patient sources are chased away by the effects of the union.

Kaiser has had an image problem for over 50 years that it has tried very hard to overcome, with some modest success. It will never fully overcome it though until it actually solves the real problems that it has.

It is possible though.

 I remember the days 35-40 years ago when a Toyota was called a "death-mobile" and was a laughed-at cheap-o Japanese toy car. How times have changed ! ! !

 I'd like to see Kaiser trend away from "General Motors" like management and employee ethics and embrace a Toyota-like commitment to excellence and tempered union influence.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Kaiser Permanente

Pros – Benefits, including paid time off is excellent. Good diversity that is generally supported by the company. Professional, knowledgeable, and overall good people to work with. For the most part, Kaiser has a positive atmosphere that strives to support its employees.

Opportunities for professional growth and career advancement abounds, especially if you work in the regional offices. Kaiser strives to be at the technical forefront, relative to other health care organizations. Being technically savvy gives you a distinct advantage.

Its also made good attempts with innovation and collaboration across the region (though not necessarily across entities).

Cons – Work experience is highly dependent on your department or group. You may feel left out if you are at odds or disagree with Kaiser's thrive culture.

Kaiser is a large corporation with all the trappings to varying degrees - office politics, bureaucracy, inconsistent communication, and hierarchy.

It is a doctor-led group and the culture of hierarchy is felt throughout the organization, with physicians granted the most respect.

Advice to Senior Management – Communicate, communicate, communicate! Slow down on the number of regional initiatives and projects. Communicate more clearly, openly and consistently on key initiatives.

Trust your staff - give wiggle room for staff to execute project plan. Management does not need to have their hands so deeply in every pot.

Stop the competition and unneeded tension amongst the medical groups, health plan, and hospitals. We are one organization, we need more collaboration!

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Kaiser Permanente

Pros – KP has good pay, generous time off and benefits and advanced resources, equipment, etc. Training support for new hires is good. Opportunity for advancement varies depending upon department.

Cons – Middle management is stretched too thin. High stress level and difficult to really take time off. Salary compression for long term employees. Union environment makes management challenging, and union staff have some better benefits than management and pay is too close to management, i.e., I had staff reporting to me that made $0.05 less than me and pay nothing for medical benefits, where I pay $340/month.

Advice to Senior Management – Add support for middle management or re-structure and improve compensation package.

Former Employee – worked at Kaiser Permanente

Pros – Kaiser offered a a really health care and vacation package. The salary was decent. The division I worked in offered a flexible schedule.

Cons – Decisions weren't always made on merit. If you'd managed to stay there a long time that factored into promotions and lay offs.

Advice to Senior Management – There are things about the large system that can't be changed. Managers should work to ensure that employees job titles are in alignment with their skill level.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Kaiser Permanente

Pros – Good benefit package. Nice office environment. Parking on site is avaiable. Low employee turnover. Employee morale is good. Stable company.

Cons – No sick leave. Work hours are longer than in competitor companies. No work from home opportunities (at least in my department).

Advice to Senior Management – More flexibility in work arrangement. Allow employees to work from home when needed, eg when the bay bridge is closed for a week!!

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Kaiser Permanente

Pros – flexible, friendly, respectful, and fairly compensated

Cons – there are too many "entitled" employees withing the organization

Advice to Senior Management – clean out the dead weight

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Kaiser Permanente

Pros – - Interaction with patients anc Community
- KP perks and employee discounts
- Emphasis on diversity and special groups

Cons – - Politics
- Clinicians who are not qualified for management positions
- Changes made without frontline support

Advice to Senior Management – Make sure all employees have buy-in into major decisions, especially those that affect them directly. Some regions perform better than others.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Kaiser Permanente

Pros – Salary. Pension after 5 years to be vested. Good inservicing program. Nurses supported by California Nurses' Assn. Union.

Cons – Kaiser keeps adding more and more responsibilities to the nurses job description. It is impossible to provide excellent nursing care AND excellent documentation. If you take the time to do your job well and document well they will tell you you have time management problems. Many managers and assistant managers do not have advanced education. When I was hired by Kaiser, I was told if you worked in a position for 6 months, you were eligible to apply for another position - and they would train you. In 3 1/2 years, I applied for over 20 transfers, but was never able to change my position. However, we had 5 managers come and go during that time. Kaiser rewards mediocracy. Most meds and patient care items are "generic", but they want nursing services to be "distinctive" while providing nurses substandard resources and support.

Advice to Senior Management – It is hard to build loyalty in your staff when you do not support nurses contributions. Patient safety and care is being compromised by cost-cutting and inadequate ancillary support for nurses.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Kaiser Permanente

Pros – Good benefits, work-life balance and job stability. The cafeteria is also good, but at this point, I'm really grasping at straws.

Cons – Where do I start? Almost everything's a joke. From the incompetence & cost overruns of our IT dept to all the political infighting and bureaucracy, this place is a complete mess. Apparently this is what happens in a monstrously large organization that's not-for-profit.

Most of the senior managers have been with the company forever. They've become thoroughly accustomed to the "Kaiser way," i.e. low quality work getting done at a snails pace through a process of tedious negotiations. Too many cooks in the kitchen, and there usually isn't an executive chef. Just a bunch of sous chefs running around like idiots.

It's probably the least empowering environment possible because at the end of the day, you realize that your work has no real impact on the 160,000-employee monster known as Kaiser Permanente.

If you're a young person looking to move up quickly, then this is definitely not the place for you. Here you'll be surrounded by a bunch of mediocre 9-to-5ers, and management will ask you to wait your turn regardless of your performance. On top of that, they have all these idiotic rules such as: raises are capped at 10%, or promotions can only be given after a certain number of performance evaluation cycles. They do a poor job of addressing underperformance, and they're horrible at rewarding excellence.

And company culture? What company culture? It's just a job. Everybody shows up, puts in their hours, and goes home. That Thrive campaign? It's just a marketing gimmick. There isn't a single company policy that actually encourages their employees to "Thrive."

Of course all of this depends on the department and manager, but generally speaking, this is what I've seen so far at Kaiser. Thrive, baby!

Advice to Senior Management – It's time to stop the inbreeding. Not every single VP/Executive Director needs to have been with Kaiser for 25 years to qualify for that role.

Every Townhall meeting is a freaking joke. There's a ridiculous disconnect between the crap that senior management spews and the day-to-day experience at the lower levels.

We have crappy managers at the top, and it shows at every level of management below. Learn how to manage and teach your people how to manage. You're like a bunch of kids pretending like you're running a business. It's time to grow up and see how things are done in the real world outside of KP. You should be ashamed of what you've built. You should be ashamed of the organization that you're a part of.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Kaiser Permanente

Pros – Very supportive; Kaiser overall pays more than its competitors, and its benefit package is substantial. They take care of their employees.

Cons – Although some Kaisers share information via computer, not all Kaisers do. This makes it difficult and frustrating to access patient records when needed.

Advice to Senior Management – To have all patient records available on computer for all Kaisers, regardless of location, so that physicians may access relevant information when necessary.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend