Gartner reviews

To summarise: Gartner SMB is an extremely immature, childish organization, run by managers who allow bullying and believe in “management by fear”. The location is aweful and the pay really bad. Career progression is close to non-existing and you will never be allowed time off during the holiday-season. Gartner SMB is a sinking ship. What once was a great place to work has grown into a terrible place heading for disaster. Please find the full description here below. *Gartner clam to "hire only the best talent" but in the end they are doing lots of “desperate hires” to cover for everyone leaving and reaching the goal of growing the sales force. The actual interviewing process is more like a psychology test. They will ask you all kinds of irrelevant questions, dig into your childhood and analyze your life until now. The only answer "good enough" if ever to answer what motivates you is money, and if you can show them a calculation of how much you need/want to make they will give you the highest mark. Truth is though, at the moment they are having so much trouble hiring good talent that speaks another language than English so they are taking in "desperate hires" just to fill the headcounts due to everyone who has left the Company lately. *If you are looking for somewhere you and your colleagues will stay for a longer time, look elsewhere. The turnover of people on the SMB floor is really high - there is always someone having leaving drinks. *Location. The Gartner office is located in Egham. This is outside of Staines, which is a 50-minute train ride from central London. When getting to the station there are shuttle-buses picking you up in the morning and dropping you off in the evening, only during selected times. Which basically means that if you are not driving, you are trapped in the office or dependent on the buses (which are most times delayed). You are paying between £230-300 each month just in the train tickets. If you are driving you get stuck on the highway or any other traffic jam highly likely to occur in the area. *The salary is way below the industry. Any other (well-established) IT company will pay you more. This is most likely due to the location. The very low salaries would not work in central London, or elsewhere. The whole compensation plan is poor. I now make more money in central London just in my basic salary than what i did when hitting my targets at Gartner. Oh, and the quarterly bonuses they talked about in the interviews do no longer exist. The highly valued Winners Circle is being cut down, and the company is paying less and less on what was once a really amazing experience. Rumors say the CEO even wanted to cancel the whole thing to save money and show better margins to the shareholders. *In terms of culture. Imagine a kindergarten for “adults”, or 20-year olds something. That is the feeling after some time on the floor. You will be micro managed, no managers will trust you are working unless they push you and keep an eye on you all the time. Not even when you call in sick will they trust you. Not even when you are called to important doctors appointments will they let you arrive later or work the day from home. Every now and then they will have some “fun” activities, basically forcing everyone to dress up in stupid costumes and playing pointless games. You will find that people will gossip. They gossip about everyone and everything like nothing was more important. You will find people cheating on their partners and families with teammates, colleagues, managers etc. Oh, there is bullying as well but none of the upper-managers seem to care about this. This is an extremely childish organization/business unit, in which the average age is probably 25. *People are promoted from Account Executives to Area Managers based on numbers and not on their people/managerial skills. As you can imagine this result in some catastrophic results and some managers think “management by fear” is the way forward since they are completely incompetent in managing a team. Some managers will respect your private time and realise you have a life outside of work, whereas some managers will force you in to multiple pointless stupid activities both weeknights and weekends. All paid for by yourself. *If you want any time off October – December 31st just forget about it. Even when your region is completely closed during the holidays, they will make you work. If you asre lucky they will let you “work from home” on the 24th of December, but trust me, the managers will be pinging you on im every hour to check up on you. Remember they don’t trust you. You will have to come in to the office the very last days of the year, including 31st of December, even if you have absolutely nothing left to do. There is no consideration for everyone wanting to spend time with their families during the holidays. *When you finally decide to leave the company they will try and keep you by saying there will be “management positions” for you in the future. Do not fall for this. Leave as fast as you possibly can. Do not look back. Run! Or do not even join to begin with. Any other company will be a better place, or at least not worse.

Where do I begin? Gartner really seems like the "dream" job. I sure believed it to be, so I know there is a good chance that this will have little effect on those reading this. But it is something I have needed to write for a while. I was so happy the moment I found out I got the job at Gartner. They were relocating me for an inside sales position after a grueling interview process and I remember feeling extremely excited and proud that I had made it to such an amazing company. (So excited in fact, that I didn't even care that the relocation check didn't cover half of what it ended up costing me to move, or that I was completely on my own in finding a place to live - having never been to the area before). But money wasn't the issue (at first). I knew I would have to work hard to be successful - and that was not a problem. Management was the problem. I was immediately placed with an extremely incompetent "leader." Someone who's primary and only goal was their own success, regardless of who they had to throw under the bus to get there (which ended up being the entire team over time - until the manager was finally let go as well). But I worked hard and did extremely well. I kept drinking the "kool aid", and found myself repeating sentences like "Oh yeah, it's great! Great work life balance, PTO, a gym, a cafe.." whenever anyone asked how Gartner was. I'd still find myself repeating it even after I had realized the food was crap, the gym had the worst equipment, and no one could even use their PTO when they wanted to. Eventually I was miserable, but I just couldn't admit it to myself. It was like I found myself in a toxic relationship, afraid to leave because of what everyone else would think, and more afraid I wouldn't find anyone better. Long story short - I realized the problem stemmed from even higher up. The manager's boss was just as incompetent, and his boss, even worse. When a leader sits in an office within the same vicinity as their entire chain below them, and does not once bother to walk through the sad little rows of cubicles for a single word of encouragement - you know you have a serious issue. And the denial! Denial (or just pure avoidance rather) infected the entire floor like the plague. If you weren't doing well - it definitely wasn't the incompetent analyst who couldn't correctly calculate quotas to save her life. And it definitely wasn't all the issues coming from the other executives who consistently blocked you from speaking to your own accounts daily. It definitely wasn't your manager who had no experience at all in dealing with people. No! It was you! You aren't "DREAMING BIG ENOUGH." You aren't being ambitious enough! You have to reach higher. "But I calculated all the numbers *shows extremely detailed spreadsheet with current and historical data*" "Yeah, well if you think like that, you're definitely not going to hit Eagle" I'm sure that if you interview for the position I had, they are still repeating the same old spiel that you'll make 6 figures (when it's literally impossible). Do yourself a favor and ask for numbers, ask how many people have made that over the past year in that position. Seriously - if you are really considering a career there - DO YOUR RESEARCH. I could go on and on about the things that happened there, but I don't want this to sound like an angry rant. I want this to be a warning, or "heads up" rather, to anyone who is considering the company. I promise you, it is not what it seems. While there are people who I am sure are happy with their jobs there - 90% of it depends on the team, territory and department you get into. But anyways, after everything I dealt with, the saddest part of it all wasn't even my own story, or the stories of the sexual harassment claims amongst the office that were ignored or blamed on the victims, or the promotions being given to the "yes sirs" and the kiss ups as opposed to those truly fit for the job. The saddest part was seeing all the parents, excited college grads, long commuters - come into this job so elated about everything they were promised, only to have to leave months later in sheer disappointment when they couldn't even afford to send their kids to school anymore.