Cons:
- Not a "young & hip" technology company:
○ Which may not be a bad thing…but if you're looking for a lot of co-workers who are young people that play board games on breaks and go on company retreats to the woods, this may not be the environment for you. Many team members work remotely, or are only in the office occasionally, which can make developing close relationships more difficult. Client work is such that you may spend most of your work day alone working on projects or collaborating with people from across the country over Zoom or e-mail. This is especially the case these days since the office is closed, which has been totally the right thing to do. Most people have families, so this is a very family-oriented culture - though that doesn't mean we don't have fun!
- Not exactly the "tip of the spear" in terms of technology:
○ This is a healthcare technology & services company - if you're looking for the most cutting-edge developments in machine learning or web technology, you're not likely to find it here. . .yet. It's not because we couldn't do that if we wanted to - it's more a feature of the industry we're in. We are razor-focused on meeting our clients where they are and helping them to develop the capabilities to use their data for machine learning and other advanced and efficient technologies to improve outcomes and help patients - but we get there with baby steps (for example, some clients don't have the data mastery to understand fundamental drivers of costs to their business, much less predict those costs). We don't glory in technology for technology's sake - we craft and use technology to help our clients be as successful as they possibly can be.
- Client work can be frustrating:
When working with clients, they can at times (though rarely in my experience) be stubborn or resistant to change or even downright hostile to it. It takes a lot of patience and people-skills to teach and persuade. At times your work experience will be dictated by whatever the client is working and focusing on, which can limit your ability to grow skills and stand out. It can be tough to make progress.This issue isn't unique to Health Catalyst since it's pretty common no matter where you work if doing client work.