Great company but my group was poorly managed - Associate Director Merck Employee Review

2.0
Aug 9, 2025
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

I really appreciated how collaborative most people were. It was very easy for me to speak to people across multiple departments to get information and data I needed.

Cons

Unfortunately my specific department was very poorly managed. My manager both lacked technical skills to understand the work the team does and the people skills to manage the team. Both myself and multiple other people working under this person have felt belittled, bullied, and gaslighted and HR is completely absent. There was a lot of talent on the team but a bad manager held us back and there seems to be no mechanism to address these issues. We all would provide honest feedback in the 360 reviews but nothing ever happened. We don't have skip-level meetings and no one ever asked how we were doing with her. I resigned for another job and I know 2 other people on the team expecting to resign shortly.

Explore other reviews about Merck

5.0
Jun 30, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Excellent company to work with.

Cons

No cons encountered so far

4.0
Jun 30, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Great benefits like medical/dentist/vision, pension, stock option, 401k match. Co workers are excellent, pretty good on site symposiums, lot of diversity clubs/activities. Innovation is extremely welcomed. Diversity in research portfolio. AI/ML is heavily invested to make databases more efficient.

Cons

Micro managing, especially within the biologics department, potentially others. Promotions are limited, and pay bump is poor. Company invests too much in buying companies rather than keeping talent - lay offs let go of great talented people. Merck is afraid of investing into exploratory biology and doesn’t take risk - they even admit they would rather see other companies clinical data or R&D data rather than taking a risk. Although it’s slow going in building new software, current databases are slow and needs much improvement. Extremely poor work/life balance.

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