Forced rank reviews, minimal pay raises, aggressive off-shore staff moves - Associate Director Optum Employee Review

1.0
30 Jan 2019
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Very large company, so unlikely to go completely under There are pockets of good management which make the long list of Cons bearable Work from home potential (however, there has been strong talk of calling back telecommuters)

Cons

Forced ranging review system applied at the individual team level. If you have 3 employees, you are expected to conform to the bell curve and give one "does not meet expectations", regardless of demonstration of actual proficiency. Pay raises which do not even outpace cost of living increases. 1-2% in most cases. Aggressive movement of jobs overseas. No job security if you are in a role which could be done more cheaply in another country. Ridiculously expensive healthcare. You would think the health benefits would be great, as a part of UnitedHealth. This is not the case. Many employees use their spouse's healthcare because it is more affordable. Lack of diversity in executive management. Take a look at a picture of executive leadership. Near-constant looming threat of layoffs for the past 3-4 years. Most recent cuts were on January 29, 2019 (yesterday). Calling back telecommuters - despite nearly half of the developers being overseas (when US staff leave or are let go, the backfilling is almost exclusively done through off-shore hires if done at all) executive management has latched onto the idea that Agile development cannot be done if the US members of the team aren't sitting together in an office. This is the same company who wants you to see your doctor virtually. Apparently you can effectively diagnose an illness over Skype, but development and coding just cannot happen without everyone sharing the same cubicle farm. Hierarchy is very top-heavy. We're really good at getting rid of people below the Director level, however there is rarely a reduction in executive leadership.

Explore other reviews about Optum

5.0
8 Apr 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Good pay and people are awesome

Cons

Working for a very large company hard to keep up with emails

1
3.0
4 Jun 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Some very talented people give so much of themselves to the company, the clients and their co-workers. I work with (and have worked with) some excellent, smart, supportive people.

Cons

Too many layoffs. Upper management is clueless about how the day to day work gets done, what it takes to make certain changes to processes, and how to treat employees. Some are great. Mostly, they just look at numbers. So many of us have been doing our jobs long enough to know what is needed for certain requests. But we don't get a voice. We just have to do it and suck it up. They are firing ('reduction in force') all of the seasoned staff and let the rest deal with the fall-out. So many teams are losing good people but those people are training their off-shore replacements before they are told about being cut. So how is that a reduction in force? It's just a reduction in payroll numbers. Everyone is on edge just waiting for the next axe to fall. And we have to try and learn or teach another role with less experienced people and more work. It's crazy. On milestone anniversaries, they send an email recognition but once the milestone gets to over 15 years, you are a target. Pay and benefits are fine by me. Raises are practically non-existent, even after layoffs and asking employees to take on more responsibility. that's messed up. They talk about work/life balance but that doesn't trickle down to the actual workers who are so stressed they fear for their jobs if they don't do the extra mile. Many of us are just hanging on instead of quitting so we can at least get some severance. Others are actively looking.

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