Volt Information Reviews in Redmond, WA

Pros

If you need a job while looking for another job this is it. They are very good at finding opportunities for temporary placement and will help you get it with in reasonable standards

Cons

Benefits and pay are low. With some companies you will be with out work for 3 months before you can regain contract work with that company again. They in reality are taking part of your pay for the job you are doing.

Advice to Senior Management

Get better benefits so that employees for Volt employees. Better answers to the transition 3 moth time.

Pros

You get paid to play games.
You get paid regularly.
You get breaks on time and regularly.
Some of the team leads are cool.

Cons

You are treated like grade schoolers.
You may show up for work and find out there is no work, so you have to go home.

Advice to Senior Management

If there is no work, email us, call us, something so we don't waste gas coming to work only to find out there is none for the day.

Pros

They have lots of openings. They offer trainings. They are one of the most well known agencies. They offer a good general support and communication through employee representatives.

Volt is great if you know how contract workers are treated as a second citizen and these temp agencies exist only to rip out of you and you still want to work for the Big Names.

Cons

They rip out of your pay by the biggest among the similar agencies.
They hardly re-negotiate any career advancements or salary even after few years of service.
They threat employees with the possibility of legal actions if the employees try to go with other agency because Volt would never re-negotiate the salary.

Advice to Senior Management

They are doing great for themselves.
They rip out of the contract workers, taking advantage of the bad economy, but that's what they do for living.

Pros

always asked for how many candidates agreed to spend their own $ to fly out to redmond, wa

Cons

constantly houded to represent temporary / contractor positions as permanent .. to make it worse, asked to call candidates in other states asking them to spend their own $ on air, hotels, and taking time from their present job to have an interview at a software giant in redmond, WA .. management felt that candidates should be willing to pay $$$ just to have an interview at the software giant .. recruiters are forced to hide the fact the microsoft has a forced time off after one year ( candidates cannot work in any capacity for microsoft during this time. ). we were forced to say that volt will quickly find the candidate a permanent job at microsoft
( false ) ..

Advice to Senior Management

this is not fair to the candidate, presenting temporary contractor jobs as permanent to fill the numbers at volt.
extremely unethical ..

Pros

I did have a great experience working with the Bellevue office in Washington state. I have worked with the offices in other locations and Bellevue is by far the nicest group to work with.

Cons

It takes a huge amount of effort to get anyone to call you back from the corporate office. I was trying to get my COBRA information sent to me as well as make sure the amount that needed to be paid was correct and it was a month before anyone would call me back. I almost missed an important deadline and finally left a slightly snarky voice mail which I hated to do. On a positive note the last person I spoke to regarding my benefits was the nicest and most helpful person I have spoken to.

Advice to Senior Management

A faster turn around on response time is needed. It shouldn't take a month of me calling for me to get call back for a very simple answer to a question.

Pros

Their facilities are nicely constructed and reasonably clean. Many members of their support staff are friendly and quite helpful in clearing up mistakes from other spokespersons.

Cons

One hand soes not seem to be aware of what the other hand is doing. I've never seen so much "red tape" in my life.

Advice to Senior Management

Make sure that your HR interviewers and practioners are constantly briefed on what each other is doing. This will save a LOT of miscommunication.

Pros

In my case, our contract was with Microsoft, who provided a free metro bus pass, so it made my commute easier on the wallet, and simply having access to parts of the Microsoft corporate culture is a beneficial learning experience. The work environment of my particular group is extremely casual in regards to talking and attire, but if you push it in either one you will be called out. The management group is very friendly, but they usually know where to draw the line between fun and play. The data-driven mandates of our client is the overriding determinant of how hard or easy management comes down. You'll be told to focus especially when a backlog or extremely high volumes of support requests come in. Some fellow co-workers thought our management was too stern during those times, but the reality is you're paid to work, not play, period. That hard line is a bit softer when the volumes are low, which happens, as well. All and all, the atmosphere various greatly depending on the client's expectations of our group, although the client always expects professionalism and productivity.

Cons

The last line of my "Pros" - "All and all, the atmosphere various greatly depending on the client's expectations of our group, although the client always expects professionalism and productivity," is key: when times were slow, even management would appear to be either distracting or off-tasking, and not catching subordinates (my co-workers) off-tasking, as well. It made for easy distraction and ebbed morale. Your contract is also entirely at the whim of the client's needs, so if your group does poorly or the client's product or service needs to be down-sized, you're likely to go. I've found it's what you do in the busy times that keeps you there - if you're more productive than the rest - and perhaps what you do in the downtimes - namely, don't Facebook or stream videos of some shtick when managers are in the room scanning.

Lastly, there may be some lateral opportunities in the group, but the possibility of vertical advancement seems extremely limited. Work hard and prove your creativity, determination, productivity and work ethic can benefit the Volt group and/or client in the future in higher positions.

Advice to Senior Management

I've seen management off-tasking various times, usually during down (low-volume) times, and the same for my co-workers, although more so for the latter and during more than just the low-volume times. At one point a former employee in my group was taking short naps throughout the day and would even be doing so when management was in the room, observing others, including that individual. We were given a strike-system for time-clock management such that an accrual of x-points meant contract termination, and yet this individual was around for several, several months. That didn't help morale for me, since I was paid the same as that slacker, basically. Also, I would find other co-workers knew information pertinent to our jobs that I did not, when an email (the usual mode of communication) was not sent out; I basically had to learn it from happening to over-hear it. That was also frustrating. The managers' leadership ability relative to volume disparity was astounding. Especially when compared to other groups working for the same client, in which one team manager would hear of an agent on an unauthorized web site and within the same day fire that individual.

Pros

Large number of job openings at Microsoft, that helped me negotiate a flex hours job (to take care of kids) with my hiring manager. I went through few interviews before settling for a job that satisfied this, and my other requirements.

Cons

I feel that the negotiated pay is on the mid to lower end of the salary range, wish that was a bit higher. Performance feedback (constructive as well as positive) was largely absent.

Advice to Senior Management

Please pass on feedback from manager at the client site over to the employees proactively, and regularly.

Pros

Contract positions at Microsoft are generally readily available and Volt recruiters do an average job of matching candidates to openings. They also make an honest attempt to help educate contract employees in various technologies that are deemed important to filling those openings.

Cons

Like most agencies Volt's Redmond office is all about filling contract positions with candidates. Career advancement is non-existent in these positions, and support from agency reps while on contract is spotty.

Advice to Senior Management

Your reps that deal with employees on-site at Microsoft have a limited and often ratherh inconsistent level of training. Your post-contract transition team needs to be more proactive about helping people coming off contracts (I suspect they're just understaffed).

Pros

Rewards innovation. Known as an entrepreneurial environment.

Cons

Pay and benefits are below industry average.

Advice to Senior Management

Volt is known as a great place to start a career - gather knowledge and then leave for career advancement and pay. Pay more to get more. With the recession, there is much uncertainty. Time will tell how Volt will emerge.