TELUS Reviews in Vancouver, BC Area

Pros

I honestly can't think of any pros, except that you get a discount on products and services but that is not enough to make we want to work there again!

Cons

You're paid for 8 hours but expected to work 12! Senior Management is completely out of touch! Promotions and bonuses are based on favoritism and not how well you work!

Advice to Senior Management

Pay more attention to the workers who are in the trenches because they are the ones who know what is actually going on!

Pros

-work / life balance, allows working from home with full technology capability
-commitment to community and supporting employees to get involved
-awareness in community and country as major telco / strong brand presence
-really good people with integrity and willingness to help
-health benefits are first rate compared to most companies in Canada

Cons

-Pay & Promotion is all over the map and there isn't a process to re-mediate issues. You basically have to leave to get anywhere in this company
-slow moving ship. It's a big company with a LOT of processes. Don't expect things to get done overnight, but they are heading in the right direction

Advice to Senior Management

Respect your employees & customers, and the share price will take care of itself.

Pros

Lots of support from the leadership team

Cons

lower than average annual salary

Advice to Senior Management

increase the salary to be the same as the market

Pros

They have a Personal Objectives and Career Development Plan that each employee must do every 6 months. The employee creates his/her own objectives or is given a set of objectives that the manager expects from each team member at the beginning of each 6 month period. At the end of 6 months, each employee completes how they have missed, achieved or surpassed each objective. The manager will review each employee's performance and comparatively assess ea individual to determine salary and/or bonus increases. This form of pay-by-performance culture can be tedious for some, but refreshing for younger professionals looking for constant feedback in order to move up the corporate ladder.

Cons

There is a lot of work to be a manager at TELUS. Many of the IT team managers support double-digit number of team members. In addition to completing semi-annual reviews, managers are encouraged to source new opportunities for their employee's, but are also held accountable for their new employee's success and failures on these new opportunities.

Advice to Senior Management

Keep up the PPO, PPR and CCDP process.

Pros

Solid corporation that does provide solid career paths for the high performers

Cons

Telus has embraced pay for performance that it now includes not only 'variable pay' but development training depending on your review rating. Many previously enjoyed benefits have been eliminated. Ratings are based on the 'bell curve' so you are competative with your peers. Favoritism towards new technologies over required core technologies

Advice to Senior Management

Recognize you have star up and coming performers that need mentoring so don't dissatisfy your long term employees by ignoring them for recognition or compensation.

Pros

Decent training budget. Friendly work environment.

Cons

Salary is lower than industry pay.

Advice to Senior Management

No real advice to give back to management.

Pros

Growth & Development Opportunities are excellent
Dynamic Industry with lots of growth & change
Excellent people to work amongst, share experiences and knowledge

Cons

Challenges with constant re-organizations taking place

Advice to Senior Management

n/a

Pros

- Very large company which offers a great variety of positions and opportunities for advancement.
- 3 weeks vacation to start
- Work at home options (depending on role)
- Laptop (typically management only)
- Cell Phone / Blackberry (only some roles)
- Learning Assistance (must be applied for and dependent on area's budget)

Cons

- Mistakes at TELUS are not seen as an opportunity to learn. All failures are regarded as business critical, regardless of whether they truly are.

- Senior management does not understand work/life balance, even though they pay lip service to the concept. All management employees are expected to work well in excess of 40 hours per week, even if they are able to manage their schedules effectively enough not to actually have to.

- Compensation and benefits have been cut year over year and are no longer market leading. Raises at TELUS are all but impossible to come by unless you are in the top 5% of the organization. Unfortunately to be in the top 5% has little to do with actual performance and more to do with whether or not your VP likes you.

- Learning Assistance has become very difficult to come by.

Advice to Senior Management

TELUS needs to realize that the baby boomer generation is beginning to retire in droves, and over the next 5 years the majority of TELUS' senior experts are going to leave the organization (if they have not already). Instead of courting and catering to the under 40 TELUS employee's, TELUS instead insists on following a strategy that makes younger employees leave the organization. TELUS needs to be competitive in the employment market and that means competitive benefits and compensation.

Pros

-Great corporate citizen
-Stable company, job wise and for employee stock purchase
-Seems to be lots of changes going on
-My co-workers are some of the best people I've ever met
-Great commitment to healthy lifestyles
-Well positioned in the market

Cons

As much as we try to say we're a lean tough company sometimes there are still relics of the public phone company past. I've met a few directors and VPs who are just putting in time until retirement. They're telco lifers from BCTel, AGT who don't have the senior leadership qualities worthy of their title.

Advice to Senior Management

Clean house on the vestiges of the government phone company.
BT is a circus.

Pros

Since Telus is such a large company, your experience may vary. But in general, great opportunities for co-ops and new grads (for the first few years anyway). As well, work life balance is great and the company pays well compared its competitors. That is amplified even more when you realize that there aren't many professional jobs in Vancouver.

Cons

Company is shedding jobs left and right, but Telus stock is doing great right? As well, too much politics and management trying to protect their own ass instead of doing what's right. All it shows is that if you game the system, you'll do alright.

Advice to Senior Management

Re-assess the incentive structure. To many decisions are made to benefit a "team members" own BU and by extension their own bonus, while hurting other BUs and the company overall.