Surprised by so many positive reviews
Pros
Fully stocked kitchen with the ability to request purchase of snacks, drinks, and meal items every two weeks. Every so often, there will be catered lunch or team happy hour. After one year, 401k match is 100% vested. Since it's such a small company, the CEO and CFO are easily accessible.
Cons
I don't usually write reviews but I feel like I need to be truthful to help others who may be making the decision to join Title21. Below are some notes of my experience. Job duties: I applied to be a business analyst and I felt like they tacked on project manager right before I signed the contract. In practice, it's difficult to manage a project that you are unfamiliar with, and made me feel more secretarial than I liked. On small projects, I don't believe that a dedicated project manager is needed, and makes for "too many cooks in the kitchen". Additionally, upon the departure of a colleague, my duties shifted to mainly project management focused. I was invited to a client meeting only to find out at the end that I was there to take notes, not to be a business analyst on the project. I had five years of experience in a similar field, and I felt like my experience was being pushed to the side. Onboarding/training: There was no formal training plan, but I spent 2-5 hours per week being taught the products and workflows by more senior team members. This was only for the first few weeks, and were canceled when more pressing meetings arose. A lot of the training was self-driven, reading documentation and playing around in a test system. Work hours/time logging: Employees are expected to log their time down to 15-minute increments, including the client and what tasks were accomplished during that time. I can appreciate timekeeping for client billing, but I think management needs to recognize that every single minute of every single day is likely not billable, and logging as such takes away from employee productivity and makes them feel micromanaged. Stated office hours are 8:30am-5:30pm, with little room for flexibility. I often was the first person to leave at 5:30pm, even though I had gotten there around 7:30 or 8am because I work best earlier in the day. I will note that I never asked for earlier working hours, but I did not get the vibe that would be approved nor did I want to ask for special treatment. I often asked around for additional work since I had extra time, but seasoned staff members seemed overworked and overwhelmed, which meant they were unable to spend time teaching me how to help because it was faster for them to do it themselves. Pay and benefits: Average to below-average pay for the location; healthcare coverage doesn't start until 60 days of employment; low PTO and doesn't start accruing for 6 months; unable to contribute to 401k, even your own money, for a year (after that, they will match a certain percent which is immediately vested). Overall, I mostly agree with the more recent critical reviews, and have to wonder how they received so many positive reviews.
