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What's It Like Working For Worldcom?
Tetch asks: "I work for a multinational IT company which seems likely to transfer its "network services" team to (MCI-)Worldcom under the terms of a business arrangement (Worldcom's gonna run our company network for us). I'm contemplating transfering from my current position to that network services team but would quite like to know more about Worldcom's corporate culture before taking the plunge (since it seems I'd become a Worldcom employee in fairly short order). Does anyone have any experience of life at Worldcom they could share?" It's always smart to try get an idea of the climate in a company before you you try and sign up.
"Is it all white shirts, and singing the company song at 07:00, or is it T-shirts, jeans, company masseur and free donuts ? Do they work you into the ground till you burn out and then cast you aside with the trash, or do they look after you, nurture your career, notice your contribution without you having to sing your own praises the whole time. Are Worldcom folk *happy* and enthusiastic, content to be a valued part of a committed team effort, or are they cogs in a faceless machine, living in isolation and fear of visits from beancounters looking for yet more cost-savings to make for the stock-holders' benefit?"
I worked for WorldCom before the merger with MCI down here in Boca Raton, FL. I have to say that it was THE best job I had. I did LAN and Computer support for 16 sites down here. My boss was in Tulsa, OK and he only bothered me once a month when he would call me to ask me if I needed anything. I had my own office, which was huge and all the old computer I collected I networked together in my office so I could learn more. I didn't have to punch a clock since we had a support queue and as long as my tickets were closed in a reasonable time, they didn't care if I worked from home or not. Awesome company to work, I'm sorry that I ever left the position. BTW I left because my dad needed help at his company. Had nothing to do with WorldCom.
I'm a former uunet employee, so not worldcom proper, so i can only speak from that experience. If you have clue, and manage to find yourself in the right group, it's a decent place to work. The network is huge. The training labs have more equipment than many ISPs, let alone the actual experimental labs. The network is fast, built with bleeding edge hardware, and you can bet that if it's deployed on this network, you can rely on it.
The company is global, which means (or it used to) that if you felt like working elsewhere, you could. God knows that the working atmosphere in Europe is much better than North America. =)
I work with brilliant people, and I've learned lots from them. Even if we're now officially worldcom, and part of Generation D (*gag*), and it's easy to feel like a cog in a big wheel since there's 15 departments in engineering, 93245 levels of management, stock options that are not even with reach of the Kursk salvage team, FUD concerning whether or not you're going to be employed 3 months from now, marketing focussed ways of life (I really really wish I'd bought those UUNET boxer shorts when I had the chance), and, well, I could go on, but, I still like working for the company. Why? No larger network exists, no other company still has the kind of resources we do, the big iron, the sheer scale of everything, and the people i work with. Every time I think about going somewhere else (who doesn't) I think "where?" and often draw a blank.
Like any large company, it'll depend on who you end up working for as well. Maybe everybody will suck, or perhaps everybody goes out and shoots some stick after work. You won't know until you look.
If you're going to work for worldcom proper, bear in mind that internet culture didn't extend to telcos until recently, so they're still coping with the shock of learning that ATM is *not* the future of networking. I'd check out the office you might be working for, and the people there. if it was uunet at one point, your chances of getting along are better, but that's just a guess really.
Just 'cause WorldCom is laying off people everywhere doesn't mean they suck. you could be working for the airline industry. you could be working for Nortel. Everybody is laying off.
To conclude, you won't find me telling you to run away as fast as you can. check it out.
No one will read this, of course, since I'm posting anonymously but what the hell... no one else that works here appears to be posting.
What's it like working here? To make a long aswer short, it depends who your manager is. I'm lucky enough to work for people who let me run Linux on my desktop even though it's not "officially supported." (Windows is the official desktop OS).
Other people, however, have horror stories due to the regulations in their particular group. I'm sure this is the way with most large companies.
HTH