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In the past when I was job searching I used Glassdoor to look up the company culture, but I also used Yelp to see what kind of clients/customers I was going to get and the feel for the company that way. It was a pretty good way to figure out what companies are full of themselves and treat customers (and good employees) like garbage. You could also see if the local portion of a company is similar or in line with the national brand which was helpful for jobs such as Starbucks or a grocery chain.
I only use it for reviews, I don’t believe any of these sites salary predictions, they are usually way off.
It depends on how much data they have gathered for salaries. If there are only two, sometimes it is based on estimates from Glassdoor and not actual contributions. But if there are several hundred it can be useful, but you have to keep in mind that the max salary ranges are not the norm. For example, if the range is $100K to $200K, with the average being $150K, it is unlikely they are going to be paying $200K.
Also job titles can vary. At a large company the level of "manager" or "senior manager" can include those working in more highly paid fields and those doing non-technical work which pays lower.
When talking to HR, ask them, "What is the salary range for this position?". More often than people think they will tell you. If they don't or say they can't, then toss out a number as a base salary and see if they think the position would support that. If they say it would, then you know you are in the range.
I think the reviews in Glassdoor are useful. I'd like to see the benefits become more useful, where it forces people to fill out a form for pre-selected answers. Too many replies like, "Health benefits and 401(k) are great", without it giving you any numbers.
They can't get it removed but what they do is have current employees flag the reviews for poor quality/content. So if someone had a legitimate concern but did not articulate it in a coherent manner - That review is going into the trash. Actual users have to flag it - Now what they should do is basically block all flags that come from large company servers automatically to make it harder for them to use existing Kool-aid drinkers in the company to game the system like this.
That won't work, because all they have to do is tell those employees to use mobile devices without using the company WiFi connections.
I also take a look at the general reviews. Some had bad reviews in the past and now good reviews - that indicates the organization is getting better.
Some have good reviews in the past and now recent reviews are bad. That organization is getting worse.
It could also indicate that HR or someone may be posting fake reviews for damage control. If they post ridiculous stuff for the negatives (like "None" or "No free coffee") over and over and these reviews come after a string of bad ones, it's a red flag.
I always check out Glassdoor and often will submit salary info and review of companies I've worked for.
Glassdoor DOES remove overly negative reviews. They removed one of mine which gave blatant details of the crappy work environment. I think they said it violated the terms of service or something.
So to make up for Glassdoor's pandering to toxic companies, I submitted 3 smaller, less descriptive negative reviews for the 1 very descriptive negative review they removed.
I only don't submit a review if the company doesn't exist on Glassdoor because then it would obviously be me telling the truth.
I don't think Glassdoor has much value for very large employers. The experience in one division is often very different than the experience in another division.
I also think it has an inherent negative bias. Nobody goes to a site like that to extol the virtues of their employer. They do go there when they have an axe to grind. And as we've seen in threads here, there are people who will never see themselves as the cause of their issues at an employer. Since we can't filter those opinions out at Glassdoor, it's hard to know which reviews there are wheat and which are chaff.
It could also indicate that HR or someone may be posting fake reviews for damage control. If they post ridiculous stuff for the negatives (like "None" or "No free coffee") over and over and these reviews come after a string of bad ones, it's a red flag.
Precisely. The suspicious reviews always have something that sticks out like a store thumb.
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