Optum FAQ

Pros

Great benefits, PTO is great, a lot of the people are wonderful and you can learn a lot.

Cons

Obviously business are looking to make money, but this company will lay off perfectly great people because they make too much money and immediately open reqs to hire cheaper replacements. They also lay off people to outsource jobs to the Philippines because it is cheaper. Anytime they buy a company they lie about their plans and lay off people for no reason. Even during a global pandemic. They pay well below market. I got a job at another PBM doing their exact same thing making 40% more money.

Advice to Management

Start looking at why your good workers are leaving and instead of being mad at them for it make things better for your remaining employees and learn from your mistakes. Don’t have temper tantrums and screw yourself and clients over just to prove a point.

Pros

Laid back atmosphere and supportive upper management.

Cons

Benefits, pay, and maternity leave.

Pros

It is a paycheck It is a job

Cons

The paycheck is smaller than industry standard. The job will most likely get outsourced or you laid off. Optum steps over dollars to pick up nickels. Guide to avoiding working for Optum: PAY: The reviews on Glassdoor regarding pay at Optum are totally correct. The pay is well below industry standard for doing the same work. If you have a family. If you have a tight income. If you have bills or personal responsibilities of any kind, this is one employer you cannot trust to pay you well. Even if you ignore this warning and work for Optum anyways, uoi will see 1-2% annual merit increates (yet benefits and cost of living are +8% each year). You will also most likely not receive a good bonus or a bonus at all. The huge bonuses you read about in the papers are reserved fpr pay grade 30 and above (director and up). DO NOT BANK or plan on receiving a bonus very year, regardless of how hard you work and what you deliver for Optum/UHG. BENEFITS: Benefits are horrible ($2700 deductible?; Really...from the largest healthcare provider, THIS is the bets Optum/UHG can do for their employees?). Also there are all of these supplemental insurances you can but that really are over prices and amount to nothing. No pension! Fortune 6 company, made $270 billion last year (yes, with a “b”), yet no pension for you…yet GREAT bonuses for the execs. Do not work here if you have any sort of retirement planning in mind. CAREER: It is a great mystery how maneuverability works within Optum/UHG. You will hear how to come in, get your foot in the door and then you can move around. FALSE! Please read the reviews on here. If you do decide to ignore this guide and take a job at Optum/UHG, prepare for annual layoffs and jobs being moved to India. If you survive that, after taking on the jobs of people who left the company (since there has been zero growth positions at Optum, and they do not backfill), you are now doing 2 or 3 people’s jobs, for the same lower than industry pay, with terrible benefits and no maneuverability. If you manage to live through all of this, be prepared to keep exactly the same job you came into the company with…with no promotional opportunities. LEADERSHIP: Optum enjoys a “bottoms-up” leadership style. Leadership is completely non-existent, leaning on the employee to define their job duties and role son their own, and hope the teams they interact with share the same view. If you ask your leadership to, well, actually lead and make a real decision they will make YOU feel like you do not know how to do or handle your job. It was the oddest leadership style and structure I have ever experienced. The phrase I heard from leadership many times was “We are successful despite ourselves”. Wow, if that doesn’t inspire you to do great work, I do not know what will. CULTURE: Ignore all of the cultural talk. No one walks the walk or talks the talk. Optum remains a white male patriarchal driven institution. Women are NOT paid equally. Minorities are NOT treated equally. Sexism, racism, and nepotism are rampant at Optum. Optum, there should be NO ‘isms” in the workplace AT ALL. The only constant is that senior leadership continue to receive large bonuses while the culture around them crumbles to all time low levels of morale and super high levels of attrition. Again, read the other reviews on here and take employment at Optum at your own risk. You were warned!

Advice to Management

Enjoy your big bonuses! Your employees pay for them with their hard work and dedication. In return you respond with annual layoffs, intimidation of employees 55 years or older to retire, and constant shifting of jobs to India. No growth, no promotional opportunities, no increased pay, no cheaper benefits, no improved culture. The only constant is that leadership and execs will continue to get huge bonuses at YOUR expense, and in kind to the expense of your work-life balance and financial stability. WORK AT OPTUM AT YOUR OWN RISK!!!! P.S. - "Rate CEO Performace".. what a joke. Didn't Andrew Witty get fired from GlaxoSmithKiline in 2017? Good job Optum, hire the guy that got fired from the largest pharmaceutical company in the world. Good job taking the trash another company saw no benefit in retaining. Again, work at Optum at your own risk!!!!

Pros

Base salary is competitive, my team uses a modern tech stack. May not be true for a lot of other teams within UHG/Optum. Lots of flexibility to work remote as long as you are a productive team member. I do get a decent spec computer for programming. If you are a good programmer you will get plenty of opportunity at Optum, but the work may not always be impactful. Very stable employment. 23 days of PTO and I don't feel pressure to work extra hours.

Cons

Lots of middle management to deal with. Can be hard to accomplish things at times. Your computer is extremely locked down even if you don't deal with sensitive data. I don't feel a personal connection to my product. I don't feel that my product helps many people. Benefits are bad. Healthcare is horrible, I think my max out of pocket for out of network providers is $13,000 on the High Deductible plan and the deductible itself is $6000. I am beginning to view this as taking money out of my salary due to how high the deductible is. They do offer other plans, but the premiums are much higher. I have to do a blood test to get the additional money in my HSA while other companies will just contribute on an annual basis. They just cut the terms of the ESPP benefit, it no longer has a look back and the discount is 10% on close. 401(k) is average. Employee reviews are done by stack ranking your team. Stack ranking can be demoralizing. Your bonus is probably determined by a bonus pool. Some politics higher up, but at my level there is almost none. It can be a bit annoying to hear Town Halls preaching change, but many innovative projects will get canned by execs because they don't have short term ROI.

Advice to Management

Stock at an all time high and you cut the ESPP.... Take a little risk in long term projects that show promise.

Pros

Resources are plentiful in all areas

Cons

Steering a 100 ton car

Advice to Management

Culture matters more than you think