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    City of Seattle Reviews

    Updated July 18, 2018
    256 reviews

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    Full-timePart-time
    3.3
    StarStarStarStarStar
    Rating TrendsRating Trends
    Recommend to a friend
    Approve of CEO
    City of Seattle Mayor Ed Murray
    Ed Murray
    75 Ratings

    256 Employee Reviews

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    Pros

    • "Work life balance is great and you never have to talk your work home with you" (in 36 reviews)

    • "Flexible schedules, competitive pay and benefits" (in 15 reviews)

    Cons

    • "In general, upper management seems only to care about their politics rather than the well being of the staff" (in 6 reviews)

    • "After a while you realize no one takes you seriously because you're an intern" (in 5 reviews)

    More Pros and Cons

    1. "Electrical engineer"

      StarStarStarStarStar
      • Work/Life Balance
      • Culture & Values
      • Career Opportunities
      • Comp & Benefits
      • Senior Management
      Current Employee - Anonymous Employee
      Current Employee - Anonymous Employee
      Recommends
      Positive Outlook
      Disapproves of CEO

      I have been working at City of Seattle full-time

      Pros

      Fantastic benefits
      Great pay
      Fun work environment

      Cons

      Too political
      So much regulations that doing your job can get sort of stressful

    2. "Great place to work"

      StarStarStarStarStar
      • Work/Life Balance
      • Culture & Values
      • Career Opportunities
      • Comp & Benefits
      • Senior Management
      Former Employee - Anonymous Employee
      Former Employee - Anonymous Employee
      Recommends
      Positive Outlook
      Approves of CEO

      I worked at City of Seattle full-time

      Pros

      the people.pay. benefits. management

      Cons

      If you hate government work not the place for you

      3. Join the City of Seattle team
      See Our Latest Jobs

    3. "Good benefits, horrible bureaucracy"

      StarStarStarStarStar
      Current Employee - Anonymous Employee
      Current Employee - Anonymous Employee

      I have been working at City of Seattle full-time

      Pros

      Great benefits including sick leave, vacation time, and health. Fairly informal work environment.

      Cons

      Bureaucracy. Everything takes a long time and change comes slowly.

    4. "Great Environment"

      StarStarStarStarStar
      Current Employee - Anonymous Employee
      Current Employee - Anonymous Employee

      I have been working at City of Seattle full-time

      Pros

      - Working in a diverse environment
      - Great pay and benefits
      - Many opportunities to grow

      Cons

      - Some employees seem like they are just in it just for the benefits

    5. "HR"

      StarStarStarStarStar
      • Work/Life Balance
      • Culture & Values
      • Career Opportunities
      • Comp & Benefits
      • Senior Management
      Former Employee - Anonymous Employee
      Former Employee - Anonymous Employee
      Recommends
      Negative Outlook

      I worked at City of Seattle full-time

      Pros

      Opportunities for growth, diversity work

      Cons

      Bureaucracy & unions, negative employees

    6. "Data Analyst"

      StarStarStarStarStar
      • Work/Life Balance
      • Culture & Values
      • Career Opportunities
      • Comp & Benefits
      • Senior Management
      Current Employee - Data Analyst in Seattle, WA
      Current Employee - Data Analyst in Seattle, WA
      Recommends
      Positive Outlook
      No opinion of CEO

      I have been working at City of Seattle full-time (More than 8 years)

      Pros

      Age friendly workplace -- good retirement benefits.

      Cons

      More difficult (red tape) to request for position upgrade than in private sectors.

    7. Helpful (1)

      "Terrible place to work"

      StarStarStarStarStar
      • Work/Life Balance
      • Culture & Values
      • Career Opportunities
      • Comp & Benefits
      • Senior Management
      Former Employee - IT Project Manager
      Former Employee - IT Project Manager
      Doesn't Recommend
      Negative Outlook
      Disapproves of CEO

      I worked at City of Seattle full-time (Less than a year)

      Pros

      Benefits, although the benefits were far more expensive than needed. Other places pay much less for the same benefits....

      Cons

      I left an executive position behind because I was mislead about the position. I later found out they lied and every project was on fire beyond rescue, when they told me they were great. Was told a promotion would happen right away. Turns out all the other new hires were told the same thing and none of it was true...

      The management in IT was junior at best. The IT consolidation was a disaster. I found a lot of the managers were hired with no previous experience for their roles by friends and family.

      They key to moving up here is to outlast everyone. In 20 years, you can be a Director. Mind you the people with talent will make executive for far more pay in far less time and will actually earn it on merit.

      HR is mediocre. Protects lazy and bad behavior such as peers yelling and practically challenging each other to fight, etc. No accountability whatsoever. Long time employees can do whatever they want without any repercussions, they are Royalty protected by HR.

      Waste of tax payer dollars.

      Advice to Management

      None, they are too inept to listen anyways.

    8. "Computer Systems Analyst"

      StarStarStarStarStar
      • Work/Life Balance
      • Culture & Values
      • Career Opportunities
      • Comp & Benefits
      • Senior Management
      Current Employee - Anonymous Employee
      Current Employee - Anonymous Employee
      Recommends
      Neutral Outlook
      No opinion of CEO

      I have been working at City of Seattle full-time

      Pros

      Great work/life balance. Ability to train other skills through out of class assignments.

      Cons

      Hard work goes unnoticed and promotion is driven by politics.

    9. "Energy Market Analyst"

      StarStarStarStarStar
      • Work/Life Balance
      • Culture & Values
      • Career Opportunities
      • Comp & Benefits
      • Senior Management
      Current Employee - Anonymous Employee
      Current Employee - Anonymous Employee

      I have been working at City of Seattle full-time

      Pros

      The people here are supportive. Management allows for pretty good autonomy

      Cons

      No work from home options. Not as flexible as some others in the way of flexible start and stop times

      Advice to Management

      Could be better with encouragement of internal transferring

    10. Helpful (1)

      "Just ok"

      StarStarStarStarStar
      • Work/Life Balance
      • Culture & Values
      • Career Opportunities
      • Comp & Benefits
      • Senior Management
      Current Employee - Anonymous Employee
      Current Employee - Anonymous Employee
      Doesn't Recommend
      Neutral Outlook
      No opinion of CEO

      I have been working at City of Seattle full-time (More than 3 years)

      Pros

      The best thing about working at the City are the benefits.
      Medical, Dental, Vision were top notch. I have not seen any other companies (including tech) that are on par with the City of Seattle.
      The City also offers a great pension plan, elective 401k plan. generous PTO with separate sick day allotment.

      Some city workers were generally nice but it depends on the department and the division within the department. It isn't surprising that the departments that had the nicer employees were citizen facing groups such as human services, early education.

      Otherwise the admin, back-office, IT, accounting depts had plenty of cantankerous, ornery, disagreeable workers.

      Cons

      Work culture is not very good. There are many antagonistic, cantankerous, snarky, and negative people across many departments who love playing office politics. If you decide to take a job at the City, be aware of this.

      Advice to Management

      Too many resources are spent on non-essential work and people. Shift your resources from the highly paid back-office employees to the divisions that directly serve the public such as human services, early education, parks, homelessness.

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