Credera Employee Reviews about "growing pains"

Pros

Quality of my Colleagues Opportunities for Growth, both personally and professionally Mentors I want to emulate Ability to drive meaningful change and growth for clients

Cons

With rapid growth has come some awkward growing pains - I am pleased to see how we have transformed from small and local, to medium and regional, to national and large, and now to global boutique. The leaders strive to maintain meaningful local connections while serving global clients.

Pros

Great place to work culturally. People are collaborative, accommodating, friendly, trusting and all around good people. This combo is rare at consulting firms doing work at this high level.

Cons

Internal tools for HR etc can be tricky to use and seem to keep changing - seems more like growing pains and comes with the territory of expanding so quickly. Can also feel disconnected from other offices.

Pros

The best thing about Credera is its people, and I've never been more excited about our CEO and the rest of the leadership team than I am right now.

Cons

As a consulting company owned by a parent that primarily owns marketing agencies, there's vocabulary and dynamics that take some ramp up time. Our growth over the past year comes with some growing pains, but the kind of problems you want to have.

Pros

- Accelerated growth as a firm resulting in numerous opportunities - Clear vision and commitment to the organization's mission

Cons

- Some growing pains related to processes and systems, but prioritization exists around addressing those

Pros

I was referred to Credera by a friend who thought the company's culture was one I would thrive in. Years later, she couldn't have been more right. I am grateful every day to get to work with the people at our firm - they challenge me and inspire me to be the best version of myself. Over the years, Credera has found a way to consistently hire people that are both smart + humble, which is a rare breed in the consulting world. Because of this, I've come to admire and respect my colleagues, which is something I don't take for granted as this has not been the case for me at previous employers. At Credera, I have been able to own my career growth. I am given autonomy and opportunities to stretch myself frequently. I truly can see my impact on the business, which I value as I know that is rare at a company our size (and growing). On that note... the company is going through a season of growth and change... but I believe we're getting ready for some of our best years yet.

Cons

We are learning through some current growing pains what we need to do and what changes we need to make to prepare for scaling the firm.

Pros

Hires people that are great to work with

Cons

Having some growing pains, not all bad ones though

Pros

I worked at another consulting firm for about 6 years prior to joining Credera. Before I found Credera, I thought consulting just wasn't for me anymore because I was frustrated by the dog eat dog culture and the "do what it takes to close the deal" sales mentality. Credera showed me that consulting can be about building each other up and more about helping our clients than "selling" to them. Most companies give lip service to culture, but until you've been at a company that actually has a good culture, you can't really understand what good culture is. - Credera truly has a great family-like culture that cares about me, my career, and my work-life balance. Also, the talent bar is very high in recruiting, so I don't feel like I'm having to pick up slack for any peers that are "in over their head".

Cons

Credera is a smaller but growing consulting company. There are some internal processes that are not as mature as at the larger consulting firms, and there are some growing pains as Credera figures out what "bigger" looks like for us.

Pros

People are awesome to work with. Every person I have worked with highly upholds the Credera values. I have loved every team I have worked with. Company trips are super fun. Last year the whole company flew to New Orleans and it was a blast. I get to learn new technologies consistently and have a bunch of opportunity.

Cons

We are having hard growing pains as the CEO/partner team is trying to balance being a tight wad and investing money back into the company. Also the annual review process is a nightmare, though changing.

Pros

I've been at Credera for just under 8 years, and am so excited about where we are going as a company. Being here this long, I have seen a lot of changes as we have grown, and could have had multiple opportunities to leave if I ever felt like the heart behind our culture was changing. As we grow, Credera's leadership continues to learn and mature, and when approached with open communication, wants to hear concerns and make changes if and when they can. I am excited about our continued growth in terms of diversity and inclusion, and cannot wait for the future as our culture continues to benefit from all of these efforts.

Cons

I have seen some massive changes over my time, and we have experienced some growing pains which is par for the course.

Pros

When I was initially hired by Credera I thought about immediately writing a Glassdoor review, but decided I could write a better review once I had spent some more time at the firm. Now that I have been at Credera for over a year I feel confident that the "honeymoon" phase of my employment has past and I can write a more objective, useful, and unbiased review. Please note that I am in Credera's technical "track" and I am a relatively junior level within the firm; this review specifically speaks to my experiences in that segment of the company. I can't imagine my experience being significantly different from the non-technical or senior guys, but it still might be worth it to look for a management consultant's and/or a more senior level perspective in addition to mine. It is particularly difficult to give a glimpse into what the Credera is like since each consultant's experience is different based on the client and project they are staffed on. I found it funny that the standard answer to almost all of my interview questions was "it depends followed by an explanation of why"; now that I am inside the firm I totally understand. A large portion of your work depends on the client, the project, and the Credera resources you are working with. Given the ambiguity, if I had to write a one line summary of my experience at Credera it would be: "It is the best place to work for the right people" A good follow up question you might be thinking is "who are the right people?". I think the ideal person for the firm is someone who is smart, self-motivated, hates red tape, and is humble. My first project for the firm was a solo project. It was me, the client, and a very aggressive deadline. During the project I had carte blanche to get the project done. From Credera's point of view there was no process or procedure that held me back. I was able to talk to senior level clients and Credera simply trusted me to do what was right. It was true freedom and the sense of accomplishment upon completing the project was akin to an athlete winning a game. My first project was truly an exhilarating and rewarding experience. Many companies pay lip service to trusting their people, but this is the first place I have ever really felt like it. The flip-side to this is that you can fail. If you like to fly under the radar, "check out", or otherwise avoid getting it done, the freedom given to you will make you miserable as you are the only one responsible for its failure . So without further ado a brief list of what I feel the pros of Credera are. I have added side comments in parenthesis where I felt I wanted to clarify. Pros: ⁃ Talented and genuine people. ⁃ Trusting leadership which empowers their employees (love you guys!) ⁃ Culture that is honest, professional, humble, and acts with integrity. ⁃ Logical company policies. (If there is a policy that doesn't make sense leadership actively seeks feedback to fix what is broken.) ⁃ Great company trips. ⁃ Company actively involved with charity and good works. (We did an activity with Mercy Street last year as well as donated money to many other organizations) ⁃ Good work-life balance. (Project Director spoke with me when I was running on empty during a particularly difficult project). ⁃ Fair compensation letting me focus on work and not worrying about pay. ⁃ Company promotes learning and growing. ⁃ Rewarding mentorship program and review process. (The reviews here are used for more than just determining who gets a raise) ⁃ Open information about the financials of the firm, new hires, people leaving the firm, and family events. (It is refreshing to have all of the information on the table during our monthly meetings) ⁃ Broaden your technical horizons rapidly to learn new technologies and methodologies. ⁃ Deepen your understanding of what you already know to a new level. ⁃ Learn and improve soft skills. (As a technical guy I can't speak enough to the importance of this). ⁃ Establish a valuable network of both coworkers and clients. ⁃ Senior management has an open door policy and I feel that I can talk to any of them. ⁃ Ping Pong at the office to unwind. ⁃ Did I mention the Great people?

Cons

I think many of the things that I have disliked are a function of consulting rather than working specifically at Credera. All of my previous experience has been in industry and consulting is definitely a change of pace. From what I understand many of these complaints apply to most consulting firms and according to acquaintances are relatively mild at Credera compared to other firms. For me, the single hardest thing has been the contrast between the Credera culture and the client culture. The Credera culture is awesome, but I spend most of my time on site with the client. Learning to be remotely connected to Credera was difficult for me. Plugging into the "mothership" during monthly Credera meetings as well as reaching out to my mentor and senior leadership for lunches has been invaluable for refreshing and keeping in touch. Otherwise it was too easy to feel like a satellite far removed from the great Credera culture. The second difficulty I had was being staffed on projects that were not in my skill set. I had to learn new (to me) technologies on the fly with a deadline. This was not fun especially with old technologies that did not interest me. Finally, it can be hard as a consultant to not have complete ownership of the project. The client always has the final say. Learning to take a project that might be in disarray because of bad decisions and put all the pieces together is tiresome hard work when you could have just done it right from the beginning. This can be frustrating when the clients don't have the resources in house to understand the problems you are trying to communicate to them. Learning to balance the client relationship and technology considerations has been a difficult learning curve for me. Cons: ⁃ Might spend lots of time away from Credera on client site. (It can be rough working for a great company but being placed on a client isolated from the great culture) ⁃ Requirement at higher levels for technical people to be involved with business development (This has not yet affected me at my level, but I felt that it was worth mentioning). ⁃ If you are used to being the best in the room be prepared to get brought down to earth. You will be surrounded by people who WILL be smarter than you. Time to be humbled! (For me it can be hard to admit I don't know something and being surrounded by people that know more than me makes me check my pride) ⁃ Could get staffed on a project that is not in your "wheelhouse". (Meaning you could be on a project that is not in your skill set and you will have to learn on the fly. This is a bummer if the technology you are learning does not interest you and you have to learn it under a deadline) ⁃ Company is still growing and you will be subject to some of those growing pains. (Kind of vague, but things change as our size grows and even in the year I have been here I have seen us having to figure out what the larger Credera looks like) ⁃ The company has very religious ties. This does not bother me, but if you are offended by even hearing mention of God, Credera might not be a good fit for you. (For example we have prayed at company gatherings and the CEO mentions God in company meetings) (I also must point out that the leaders are VERY tolerant of other views/religions and there are many people employed here who are not of the same faith as them; myself included) ⁃ Credera is a smaller company so the benefits aren't the best. (I pay more for my health insurance here than I previously did.) ⁃ Consulting involves lots of uncertainty. (every client and engagement is completely unique. If you don't like uncertainty this might not be the best industry for you) ⁃ You could be put on a client with a long commute and/or travel. (Very few people travel, but there are some. For the most part people commute locally to clients or work out of the Credera office) ⁃ Lots of work (couldn't decide whether to put this under pro or con. I always prefer to have interesting things to do, but to some it could be viewed as a negative). ⁃ Sometimes polishing things for presentation takes more time/effort than the actual work. All in all I am very happy with my decision to come to Credera. I am enthusiastic about the direction of the firm and wholeheartedly endorse the CEO.