Optimity Reviews

3.4

56% would recommend to a friend

(85 total reviews)

Rick McNabb

100% approve of CEO

39% positive business outlook

Optimity has an employee rating of 3.4 out of 5 stars, based on 85 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have a good working experience there. The Optimity employee rating is in line with the average (within 1 standard deviation) for employers within the Management and consulting industry (3.7 stars).

Reviews by job title

85 reviews
2.0
25 July 2017

Not a true consulting company

Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Optimity does a great job of recruiting campus hires. You'll meet and work with talented individuals who embody the "start up" mentality--they're self-driven, intelligent, and passionate about growth, development, and ownership. Optimity is also a fairly flat organization; as long as you have the right mentality and skill set, you can lead and own your own workgroup, team, or project early on in your career.

Cons

However, Optimity lacks the sufficient experience and internal resources to effectively leverage or develop its human capital. Although certain industry groups are helmed by experienced and competent leaders, there are few subject matter experts or qualified managers to senior managers who can lead or train their teams, especially in the newer offices. In addition, the company is often forced to place its resources in staff augmentation roles in order to make ends meet while attempting to sell more strategic projects. This means that for years, you could be staffed as a single resource (or maybe on a small team) doing staff aug work that is understood to hold no real strategic value to either the resource (gaining new skills and experiences) or the company (leading to the opportunity for a bigger seat at the table, or making inroads into other areas of the business). Although this might be considered preferable to not being staffed at all, it's not why people join a consulting company. Lastly, Optimity is a privately held company, which means that the CEO can't really be held liable for his actions. Although Optimity does have an outside counsel that advises HR in cases of employee complaints, so far, no effort has been made to curtail the CEO's power and privileges, which makes for an unsafe working environment and contributes to the lack of trust in leadership and HR amongst the employees. Although the company undergoes a near-continuous cycle of self-examination to update its core values, performance management processes, etc., in an effort to alleviate some of these issues, there's been little to no improvement despite the number of hours burned. One could be more forgiving of this trial-and-error approach with a young start up, but given that Optimity's culture and business / internal processes have been forming over the past 8 years, it's not really clear whether the company will be able to turn it around.

3.0
31 Jan 2018

CEO needs to go, Sr Managers need to wake up

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

-Good work/life balance (relative to other consulting firms...low bar) -Dynamic individuals in the company -Attempting to take steps towards improving company -Good place to cut your teeth -Transparency/can make your voice heard without being punished

Cons

-Morale is low, people are leaving the company left and right -Performance management is nonexistent and sr managers shift responsibility/blame to junior staff -Little visibility into what CEO does every day, rarely interacts with majority of employees, and poor impression for when he does interact with the enterprise (i.e. coming out with decisions out of nowhere, prioritizes company loyalty above employees' individual safety) -Several junior staff get stuck on projects >1 year

2.0
20 Jan 2018

Needs Improvements

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

- Many great employees that are collaborative, engaging, and driven. - Flexible working hours - Beautiful office space in prime locations

Cons

- CEO abuses his power by making advances on new employees - Ineffective HR structure to report sexual harassment - Limited project diversity

avatar
Optimity Response
7y
Optimity takes claims of harassment of any kind very seriously. We have a well-documented reporting and escalation process that is managed by trained human capital professionals to ensure issues raised are investigated fully and in confidence. The CEO was concerned by this accusation and denies he acted inappropriately. He also stands behind the processes in place to ensure a safe, respectful and high-performing workplace, which includes investigating all claims made by employees to the contrary. All employees who have respectful workplace concerns are encouraged to submit statements and supporting facts using the process outlined in our employee handbook.
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Glassdoor has 90 Optimity reviews submitted anonymously by Optimity employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if Optimity is right for you.