MDS Reviews

Former Employee – worked at MDS full-time for more than 8 years

Pros – Good benefits
Lots of HR internal employee programs

Cons – Too much."big company" bureaucracy
Upper management bought the previous company then wanted to change it completely then wondered why the company went downhill

Advice to Senior Management – You had to sell the company so I guess you know what you needed to do

Current Employee – been working at MDS

Pros – Professional and work life balance

Cons – Training needs to be improved

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at MDS

Pros – Opportunities to prove yourself and grow

Cons – Politics; Resource-strapped upper management heavy organization

Advice to Senior Management – Eliminate politics; get organized

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at MDS

Pros – Smart people, good compensation, global business

Cons – Restructuring and shutting down of Toronto HQ

Advice to Senior Management – None

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at MDS

Pros – This CRO offered good exposure to numerous therapeutic areas. They featured a varied client base, but many of those sponsors have chosen to go elsewhere. Some of the team are competent, ethical, hard working people who are invested in theie work, and have self-motivating character.

Cons – This CRO has senior management that is, at best, marginally suited to the task of running a multi-site clinical research company. This is evidenced by the sharp decline in share value, when positioned against other CROs that enjoyed a bit of growth in the third and fourth quarters of 2009. In a nutshell, MDS gave its business away. Staff reductions rendered the company over-allocated and under-resourced, bloated in some areas, but drastically slashing labor force in others. Interestingly, they chose to reduce the clinical staff before reducing the administrative staff- a poor choice when quality data is your bread and butter. Site specific leadership was abyssmal in my experience. The director in this case was too young/ junior to understand what was needed to run the site effectively, and couldn't operate outside of a small comfort zone.

Advice to Senior Management – Anything offered at this point would be moot- a day late and a dollar short. In their next roles, perhaps they would be served well to visit the front lines on occasion, and listen carefully to what they hear on the ground. Getting information solely from site directors results in heavily filtered, spun messages that don't accurately convey the state of affairs. Overall, treat your employees as though they are your most valuable commodity- because they are.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at MDS

Pros – It is a job with I believe resonable pay.

Cons – With the change in senior management a few years ago, the company changed from a company respecting people to one that cares about numbers. The trend is getting worse and worse. Please note that MDS has three business units (Nordion in Ottawa of Canada, Analytical Technologies headquartered in Concord of Canada and Pharma with a head quarter in King of Prussia in US) and offices all over the world. Each business unit and each site may be different. The comments here is more applicable to the MDS Corporate located in Toronto of Canada.

Advice to Senior Management – Management is about people, not just numbers.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend