Pros
The abuse you will be subjected to at IPVM and the duress you experience will help you establish valuable boundaries you will utilize the rest of your life. The psychological and emotional scarring you will receive at IPVM will shape and galvanize you into becoming a stronger version of yourself. You'll also walk away with a lifetime of hysterical phrases and ridiculous references you adopted during your likely brief experience at IPVM. IPVM will likely induce the need for therapy, which is also good for personal development, and is a great way to alleviate the PTSD IPVM and its founder have left you holding. Should you choose not to seek professional help following your time at IPVM, not to worry, there is a discussion group for former IPVM employees who can provide grief counseling.
Cons
How do you distill an intensely negative experience from which your bruised psyche is still recovering, into bulletpoints? I would love to suggest that time heals all, but it seems when it comes to IPVM and its founder John Honovich, history is quite the opposite. I know how it looks, you see an organization who positions itself as a tech company, an educational institution, a world news outlet, "the Consumer Reports of the physical security industry" who other media outlets you've actually heard of who don't know any better have reported on, and you see a chance to make a difference and really elevate your career. You're likely a student or recent graduate, or someone with little professional background who doesn't recognize the misinformation they are being pitched. What you're really looking at here is a glorified blog whose credibility is in a tailspin and has embodied a plague that has sickened the physical security industry for years, largely regarded by industry titans behind closed doors as a joke, governed by an ever-changing set of HR policies authored by a manager with no professional background or experience in HR, micromanaged by a founder with bipolar tendencies who also lacks professional background. While on the topic of HR, expect constant heartache. The absolute, number one mistake you can make is placing any trust whatsoever in IPVM's HR processes or management. First, it's important to note that a healthy work environment or culture is not only discouraged at IPVM, one is actually penalized or fired for vocalizing such expectations. This is not a recent problem for IPVM either, if you talk to employees who left the organization 10+ years ago, the same could be said then that is said now. Unlike any past experiences you might have where HR is governed by a code of conduct or privacy, again, the case is quite the opposite here, the worst mistake you can make is giving any more information than just the basics to IPVM HR. To that end, payroll and taxes are again a situation where inexperience is to your detriment at IPVM. When you part ways with IPVM, you lose access to all of your payroll information, tax stubs, etc., which is especially problematic when, for example, they have failed to pay your state income taxes, you weren't paid on unused vacation time, or your IRA account is missing contributions. By far the worst attribute of all working for IPVM, however, is the psychological trauma and emotional scarring you will experience under John Honovich. The signs of abuse reveal and manifest themselves in many ways at IPVM, from the few tenured employees eating away their problems and being pushed into chronic or morbid obesity, mental breakdowns that literally land them in the hospital, to emotionless "dead in the eyes" zombie-like expressions and the inability to form a complete sentence or voice their opinions for fear of being sucked into yet another debate, ridiculed, mocked, or criticized. Despite what you're told, almost every former IPVM employee will go on a sabbatical following their time with the organization as a means to mentally and emotionally recover. The only positivity on the other side of having worked for IPVM is knowing what you don't want in your daily life and/or career. Best advice, count your blessings that you took the time to read this entire review, and run screaming in the other direction.