Pfizer Reviews

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

Pros – Pfizer is full of talent and capability. People who work their are truly passionate about the pharma/healthcare industry and the good that it does. The company is very Wall Street-savvy and manages to please investors, which is not a bad thing. If you are smart and network with the right decision-makers, you can write your own ticket to a robust career. Pfizer donates to so many good causes and sends its talented personnel all over the world to work pro-bono on establishing health care infrastructure in countries where little infrastructure exists.

Cons – The company can be cheap to a default. Asking employees to fund their own relocation and international assignments is not a market-competitive practice. The New York HQ office environment can be so political that the buzz distracts employees from doing their work. There is founded and constant worry about layoffs, which happens each year at least in the hundreds.

Advice to Senior Management – Stop being penny-wise and pound foolish. People paying for their own relos or huge chunks of expat assignment expenses (like housing) is over-the-top. The C-suite should also practice what it preaches. It's not ok to cut down on benefits and downgrade jobs when you're scheduling board meetings in Bermuda with the spa completely rented out for spouses....

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Pfizer as a contractor for more than a year

Pros – Employees get great benefits and great opportunities to move around

Cons – Huge company - can have lots of silos

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Pfizer as a contractor for less than a year

Pros – very relaxed work environment, nice people

Cons – very complicated structure of groups

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Pfizer full-time for more than 10 years

Pros – Values Culture, very skilled Employees, Interesting and challenging work experience due to Multiple Operations (not boring at all), good salaries and benefits.

Cons – After the latest adquisition, an excellent place to work became a nightmare. There is no balance between work and life, not enough employees to preform the tasks necessary, moving to sub-contract most positions leading to lack of expertisse by Pfizer Employees, lack of respect to Employees due to aggressive non-inclusive management, had become a battlefield between Pfizer Legacy Management and former Wyeth Management, No-career growth path.

Advice to Senior Management – Motivate and guide your employees, support and maintain your talented employees, take in consideration field/operation's personnel opinions, don't take decisions based on wehter the employee is a Pfizer Legacy or comes from Wyeth adquisition.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Pfizer full-time for more than a year

Pros – Motivated scientists who enjoy their work

Cons – Constant R&D re-organizations mean ever changing roles and lay-offs

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company

Current Employee – been working at Pfizer as a contractor for more than 3 years

Pros – good for carerer and development

Cons – bad for current salary and bonus

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Pfizer full-time for more than 10 years

Pros – Best pipeline training in the Industry. Top in Incentive and Compensation.

Cons – Loss of patent protection. Robust generic pipeline. Over regulatory environment. All these factors have led to a company wrought with creative paralysis. Recent quarterly earnings reports have been sugar coated to cover up fact that sales force, scientists, and corporate staffs are being laid off at an alarming rate. Retained employees are seeing their severance packages curtailed and pensions are going away. Compliance regulations have ensured total sales force paralysis. When you are afraid to communicate about your products on your corporate laptops, then there is something wrong with the corporate enviornment!!

Advice to Senior Management – Do you know who butters your bread? It's the sales force stupid!!

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company

Former Employee – worked at Pfizer full-time

Pros – Good people. They truly want to make a difference. Great experience. The company (at least many divisions) is flexible with working from home and/or other offices as needed.

Cons – Very political and bureaucratic - continuous downsizing has caused the culture to become more cut throat instead of collaborative.

Advice to Senior Management – Re-ignite a culture where performance, not corporate politics, holds the greatest value. Avoid laying off colleagues who excel in their performance reviews - there seems to be a disconnect with talent management.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Pfizer full-time for more than 10 years

Pros – Strong benefits
Everyone knows Pfizer
Reasonable workload
Nice travel and perks

Cons – Career potential lost in constant survival mode in downsizing company.
Most of network over the years I was there had been laid off or left for other opportunity
No external training or conference funds in my dept
poor internal job placement and recruiting processes, seems like candidates are pre-selected and you waste time going through meaningless interviews if your even selected at all.

Advice to Senior Management – I was at Pfizer nearly 12 years so I saw the better times to the stock lows and downright unpleasant period which is still ongoing of constant outsourcing and downsizing. I benefited from a fantastic tuition reimbursement program (long since reduced to about average) and it made no difference in finding better work within the company to use my skills.
For up to 2 years at a time I saw no raises of significance 1-2% at best and promotion cycles were suspended. Management spent and promoted certain individuals by placing them in other jobs to get around this.
Regrettably I left for another opportunity as I had realized that my best days at Pfizer were years behind me.
I hope Pfizer finds its feet again and looks more critically at itself and how do develop its professionals. There is not enough transparency in the promotion process, and its not enough to be happy just to be in your dead end job for a few years. If escaping layoff cycles is the best that can be offered, just get it over with.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

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

Pros – Fair compensation for their employees

Cons – Lay offs common in the past few years

Advice to Senior Management – Work life balance

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend