Turner Broadcasting Reviews

Pros

It really is the only game in town for big-time national broadcasting and entertainment, and the perks that go along with that can be really fun.

Cons

The downsides have been few and far between in my experience. Cost-cutting measures in recent years have reduced some of the auxiliary benefits (local attraction tickets, field trips, etc.), but not enough to make it unfun.

Advice to Senior Management

Continue to foster intra-channel communication -- especially when we're expected to present a united front to our parent company Time Warner.

Pros

The benefits are great. There are company wide opportunities for movement. Programs are available for employees to learn about other jobs and divisions.

Cons

Middle managers are allowed to hand promotions to people they like, even if they don't have experience or qualifications for the job. Human resources has been slow or unable to correct the problem.

Advice to Senior Management

Senior management needs to see that middle management positions are given to employees with adequate experience and qualifications. Morale is bad enough without employees having to report to people who have no idea what their direct reports do and no interest in learning. It used to be nearly unheard of for someone with no experience in a position to be given the responsibility of managing people in that position. It happens much too often now. Morale and the product suffers for it.

Pros

Strong accounting systems
Strong finance and accounting staff
Great benefits
Competitive Compensation
The company created a career path program that was very useful to me when I started as financial analyst
Onsite daycare center

Cons

Why has the company laid off some of the best managers in their Finance and Accounting departments? The terminations did not happen all at once. They happened in a span of two years. Some of the managers are highly missed in some areas such as CNN, Film Mgt, Sports and Corporate.

- Favoratism
- No work/life balance for those working in accounting and finance
- More work, less resources
- Middle managers left have no "management and/or coaching skills", they only care about their careers

Pros

Turner offers a very good benefits/salary package for some of its employees. The company was good about offering generation vacation time.

Cons

Turner (affectionately known by me and former alums as "Turnover") is a toxic work environment.

I left EA back in 2008 after deciding that the company does nothing more than make people miserable. Since leaving, I've re-entered my profession psychologically and enjoy programming again. I've worked at several good companies since my departure, but as a senior software developer, I've also worked with quite a few former Turnover employees and all of us share the same basic story.

Turnover encourages bullying, degradation and belittlement of highly competent and energetic engineers on the part of incompetent team leads and even more incompetent middle managers. I've held off writing a review of the company, thinking that perhaps I would judge too harshly, but my current employer recently hired a former Turnover employee who, as it happens, took my place on a team there. I'm glad to have this new professional on my team, but much of what he related about his experience there mirrors mine perfectly. I write this review as a warning to other software developers who really love their craft and want to excel professionally and personally. In the time I was there and since, I can count about 30 people who quit. The company is simply not able to retain people in the EA department because of the toxic conditions promoted by the company as a whole.

The Enterprise Applications department is rife with the loss of good talent, especially in recent months, as the job market has improved. (My current client has picked up two Turneover alumni, making half our software development team now former members of Turnover.) As a former employee, in my current position as a senior software developer, I've interviewed Turnover employees looking to leave the company and their story is always the same: toxic workplace, incompetent and wasteful management, cliquishness and a total disdain for anyone who tries to improve the business and software development processes of the organization. Younger software developers especially feel a great sense of frustration that their careers and skill sets are being destroyed working on projects where costs overruns, missed deadlines and a steadfast opposition to good methodology are commonplace.

Much of this is caused by the fact that the company simply makes too much money, so it wastes valuable resources on the hiring of incompetent middle managers who treat their teams very poorly while at the same time promoting highly incompetent individuals on the basis of their gender/sexual orientation/skin color. In other cases, senior management simply shows blatant favoritism towards individuals who are pets, yes-men and syncophants. Turnover's accolades in the public sphere are about "diversity" and the promotion and women and minorities. What's left out is that competent people are often passed over for lead and managerial positions because they do not fit Time-Warner's definition of diversity. Instead, incompetent and socially retarded individuals are selected on the basis of accidental qualities. This spans all the way to the senior vice president in charge of EA.

Turnover is the only organization I've been at where *entire* teams of people quit in disgust and frustration. I saw one colleague have a nervous breakdown; another had a similar experience and quit without giving a two week notice. I saw two examples while there, of entire teams leaving, sometimes without notice. Since then, I've heard from friends and former colleagues of other cases, including a recent incident where three business analysts left because a female minority was hired at a higher rate.

Some more concrete examples of what I experienced while there for 3 years: "Senior" developers were allowed to use bullying and coercion in their encounters with team members. The EA department had a special workshop on accountability training, but in practice, it meant business as usual, where bright, enthusiastic professionals were taken into offices and brow-beat and berated by the incompetent old guard.

Preferential treatment was shown to team members who a) did not show up to work on certain days, b) did not complete assigned coding tasks, c) regularly blamed others for their own shoddy workmanship. It was especially demoralizing when certain employees were allowed to take as many vacation days as they wanted while the rest of us had to work on deadlines (in the rare cases where we actually had project work and weren't simply being cowed into bilking other Turnover divisions.)

Pros

Good benefits. Good perks. Great school for entry level applicants. A great place to start building your network and acquire knowledge about the business.

Cons

Terrible management. They're so blind they can't even see who is talented and willing to better the network. I work at creative and seldom hear feedback from management. Upper management can't even distinguish what looks good or bad on air. People that are not qualified to make creative decisions end up dictating what should be done. It's very frustrating if you're carreer oriented and hoping to advance. Raises are minimal and DOES NOT reflect your performance. And promotions are often based on seniority or for those who play the corporate game, and not so much for the ones that have talent and insight about the business. Please be mindful that my experience may not reflect other departments.

Advice to Senior Management

Please read my 'cons' section. You should really investigate what employees say on other company surveys we're asked to complete. Please hear what we have to say. All we want is to contribute as much as we can and be recognized for our efforts. Good, smart and creative people are the best asset for any company.

Pros

innovative innovative innovative innovative innovative innovative

Cons

slow and bureaucratic slow and bureaucratic

Advice to Senior Management

none

Pros

Great experience, great exposure, company name carries alot of weight

Cons

Poor management, too much red tape, promotions not based om merit rather who you were friends with

Advice to Senior Management

hire competent knowledgeable people in the managerial roles.

Pros

I can't complain about GREAT BENEFITS!!!!!!!

Cons

Management DOES NOT recognize those individuals who REALLY work hard and care about the individuals they work with.

Advice to Senior Management

STOP promoting individuals who don't know what they are doing................PERIOD!!!!!!!! Start evaluating your supervisory staff, most of them don't have a clue as to what to do in an emergency situation nor do they know how to be a backfill resource when staff is short. Make them be more responsible by giving them real responsibilities (i.e. become working supervisors not lazy ones).

-This only pertains to the BOC or Broadcast Operations Center!!!!

Pros

Liberal work environment, a chance to meet TV celebrities, discount club for local Atlanta business, good cafeteria on site, monthly give away and promotions for employees, On site Gym. No worries parking and super quick access to the highway.
Great work mates.

Cons

Reviews are based more on your physiological profile than on your actual performance. Regardless of how well you perform your job if you fail their pigeon hole idea of what is the "perfect person" you are considered a failure to upper management.
No real oversights of how funds are spent. Users spend money with out regard to to TCO's or compatibility creating more work for techs.
Little research is done on compatibility of different software components by the software team.
Information is disseminated slowing and innovation seems to be frowned upon.

Advice to Senior Management

Understand just because a person has followed the SOP of a previous employer does not mean they will not be able to adapt to your SOP.
More info in dislikes

Pros

You have the chance to work with creative, talented and hardworking professionals. There is great flexibility with work schedule. Management are willing to listen and making improvements in all areas.

Cons

The commute to work sometimes can be challeging due to the traffic conditions. However public transportaions are available and are encourage by Clean Air Campaign.

Advice to Senior Management

It is a good place to work and connect with the professional community. It is an environment that fosters the evolution of professional skills.