OPNET Reviews

Pros

- Cary dev team manager is one of the best
- Good work / life balance
- Solid design and development guidance, you learn a lot of good OO practices
- Wii room, gym on-site, break room

Cons

- Career growth and upward mobility is limited, management hierarchy is very flat
- Have to do Tech Support for a few hours a week

Pros

there is a good life/work balance

Cons

* low compensation compared to other similar companies
* the decisions that senior management makes are way too conservative without taking even a little bit of a risk

Advice to Senior Management

the only way that someone advances in the hierarchy is mostly the number of years that he/she is with OPNET.

Pros

Small company so great level of challenges. Your work is not strictly limited to your title or what you were hired to do - there is always scope for learning new things and for you to contribute positively to the development of the organization.

Cons

The management style is not the best, very strict management that is also very conservative. Not a lot of things to do beside wok when your at OPNET for example no team development activities or fun outings, events etc. Its mostly just work.

Since the company is small there are times when the work load is monumental because some teams are heavily understaffed and hence you will have to step up and lead the way. There is not much pressure from management but a normal ethical person would end up putting in more hours to complete the task at hand when there is no one else to do the job because the team is understaffed.

Advice to Senior Management

Be more open and conservative
Offer employees more time off and or more team building, office events, parties, happy hours etc. All work and no play makes jack and dull boy - and that is kind of true because of the very conservative management style and lack of things to do other than work.

Pros

Great products and technology, very smart people work and run the company. The management is very responsive to customer needs. The mgr.do things first class,very detailed and don't cut corners on things.

Cons

This company invented the term micro managed. You'd be extremely hard pressed to find another company that's more micro managed, the cultre is manage by fear not only sales but most dept.'s in the company. The pay for s/wsales is way below the industry for what your asked to do. Loved the products but wouldn't go back for twice the $$.

Advice to Senior Management

I don't have any because they wouldn't listen anyway. From their perspective they've been successful doing it their way why change,

Pros

Great products
Great people
Solid financials
A great company to have on your resume if you make it 3+ years
One of the most successful public software companies in the last 10 years!

Cons

Senior leaders can be unreasonable and rude.
Heavy micromanagement.
Very politically charged. Make sure you are in lock step with the brothers.

Advice to Senior Management

You've done an exceptional job hiring and growing middle managers. Give them more authority and ownership in the company.

Pros

learning a lot about entire IT ecosystem. always open door policy that encourages learning of products and sw and wetworks in general

Cons

little marketing support, or messaging that resonates - constantly have to craft your own - pay is a bit lower than market, but company is not overly oppressive as some have noted - so long as you are performing. issues here are no larger than any issues you may face elsewhere.

Advice to Senior Management

clearly doing well as a company -- a bit more foresight in leveraging sales enablement tools would be helpful.

Pros

The people are geniuses there. The environment is such that information sharing between people is great. A great place to learn

Small and powerful company that lets you run the show. I have learned so much about all parts of a software company as I participated in the sales to software creation to contracts process

The products are well made and well appreciated. The successes will make you look like a hero to the customers

Cons

The pay structure looks to be for new engineers. The benefits and promotion cycle is suited to those starting their career.

There is a ton of turn over with employees. Nobody leaves and says 'I hated OPNET.' They leave and say 'great opportunities but now I want to take care of my own'

For this reason, most people are quite young there, under 35.

Advice to Senior Management

The employment model is working. Making it easy to stay a long time will change the model and thus change the company. It produces good results just not long term careers at the company

Pros

Good products, good benefits, and good if you're an engineer.

Cons

Non - engineering employees are loathed.

Advice to Senior Management

None

Pros

The culture at OPNET is pretty good.

Cons

The communication could be better.

Advice to Senior Management

Communication could be better.

Pros

Industry leader for network simulation and modeling. Bethesda is an amazing city to work. The work is very interesting and engaging

Cons

Working on the consulting side of the company, I found it difficult to be noticed or recognized for my successes on customer projects from within OPNET.

Advice to Senior Management

Recognize that the job market is not necessarily the same for the entire company and you should treat different employees as commodities appropriately.