Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Employee Reviews about "manager"

Pros

The benefits package is great and comprehensive. New campus is beautiful and gives an appearance of transparency. Location near Space Needle is a bonus.

Cons

No understanding of the difference between leadership and managing/supervising. Non liberal/democrats will be shunned -- in the most passive/agressive manner possible, as this is predominant personality trait at foundation. High-school cliques, bad-behavior, gossip and mis-information determine one's perceived value, as senior-most managers take and any bits of information to churn out what they later call 'performance reveiws'. HR exists to protect upper management, period. No ability for this entity to assess, resolve, mentor, guide or direct employees that don't see eye to eye to resolution.

Pros

Benefits are great, if you click with your team it is a great community.

Cons

HR and management training could use some improvement especially compared to companies that put more time and emphasis and money on training their managers. However, if on the right team it does help!

Pros

-My manager gave me plenty of opportunities to grow my skillset but that wasn't the case with most positions. -Very professional, intelligent colleagues -Operations side of the work was very collaborative -Benefits -Perks and happy hours all over the campus were great for networking

Cons

-People will throw others under the bus often to get ahead. -Every mistake is scrutinized -You must be overqualified to get a job which can be unrewarding.

Pros

In many ways, it's like most complex organizations - constant leadership change, reorgs, shifting priorities. But at the end of each day, no matter how challenging, I walk away knowing I contributed in some way to a greater good.

Cons

Your success hinges greatly on your manager. This can be a very good thing if you have a manager who is your champion. If you don't, it could be completely detrimental to your career growth. Manager effectiveness is still very much an area of development for the organization as a whole.

Pros

The foundation’s mission attracts top talent Extraordinary health benefits and lovely campus

Cons

Managers with little supervisory and/or school leadership experience on the K-12 team Discriminatory practices that harm women Harmful HR department with outdated, male-dominant practices Excessive spending on team retreats and travel

Pros

Good salary and benefits, etc

Cons

No ability to progress and bad managers

Pros

Best benefit package. Great retirement benefits. Some awesome pool of smart super intelligent people. People from diverse background understand and follow the mission. Great campus. Get to meet with Bill & Melinda, Mr. Bill Sr., and also Warren Buffet.

Cons

Not the best place to work. Hurts to see that many people don't even follow the mission. Apparently 'All lives have equal value', is not practiced by each manager. Amazing to see that your title speaks so much about the behavior and treatment from high level people, especially in your own team. You will be the luckiest if you end up in a team that has a great manager. No growth opportunities. If u apply for other roles within the organization, you become the most unfavorable person on the team. A lot of perception which is highly biased and doesn't work in your favor. If they don't want you they will find a reason you ensure you are gone. Double standards are hurtful to see. Hoping that with the new CEO, things will change for better.

Pros

Absolutely compelling mission and an opportunity to work with world-class people from all over the world in health, development and education. There is some turn over at the foundation and most professionals come in at a mid-point in their careers and stay for a few years before moving on to the next big thing.

Cons

Sometimes difficult to see the nexus between the work being done in Seattle and how it is actually affecting people in the 'field.' Management is improving - in particular with some recent hires of true managers in the fields the foundation works in.

Pros

Excellent place to work if you are passionate about solving complex issues. There are plenty of opportunities to lead, learn and grow, despite the flat structure. The overall organization promotes work life/balance and have many policies to support employees.

Cons

Constant sea of change at all levels - staff, managers, systems, etc. Managers often have great content expertise but lack management experience which can make the work challenging. In addition, your relationship with your manager will impact how much you can balance your work.

Pros

Great benefits and prestige Talented and hard-working employees

Cons

-- Highly political and toxic environment which causes burnout. -- Internal politics prevent their talented employees from maximizing the impacts of their work externally. -- Wasted too much time in navel gazing, popularity contest and internal processes - it's a shame because there's so much unrealized potential. -- Poor middle management - most middle managers are more concerned about managing up and politics than developing their staff. -- The foundation is in the process of major staff downsizing but is unable to prioritize its ambitious scope of work. With ever expanding amount of work and dwindling workforce, the high level of burn-out is not going to get any better. Do not expect work-life balance. -- When I saw my primary care physician for my annual check-up, she asked me where I worked. When I told her I worked for the Gates Foundation, her response was 'uh huh...tough place to work. I have lots of patients working there. You better take care of yourself...' The foundation seems to have established a reputation for high burnout and prevalent use of anti-depressant. -- Tools and systems are surprisingly inadequate and ineffective considering the amount of resources it has. To develop any sort of analysis, it requires significant time suck and manual work required by employees, and the results are usually suboptimal.