Good brand recognition, bad atmosphere. - Project Analyst Nielsen Employee Review

2.0
11 Feb 2012
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Nielsen offers great brand recognition for your resume making it a great place to start your career. There are a lot of young people working there which creates a good workplace atmosphere--if you don't mind being supervised by people 1-2 years your senior. The company is turning around and might be profitable again soon. Their business model is changing rapidly; this could create some good opportunities. In Chicago, they have an office in the burbs and the Loop making it easy to choose which office to work from. Also, it seems easy enough to work from just about any major city in the US.

Cons

Frat-house management techniques--for example: my first week there, the VP noticed i left my computer on my desk over night, so to "teach [me] a lesson," he hid my computer so I'd think it was stolen. When I complained to HR, they just said, "that's the way he is!" Benefits are terrible--They only match 1/2 of your 401k contribution which vests after 3 years. Health insurance has a $1000 deductible. This makes it impossible to work here if you have kids or ever plan on retiring. Pay is also on the low end. Highly political atmosphere. Because they hire an army of young people, supervisors do not critically evaluate performance. Instead they rely on superficial traits and biased feedback from directors. I never really had the chance to work with people who were really experienced and knew a lot about the industry. All the people I interacted with were young folks hired out of college with no real-world experience. Way too much outsourcing. I almost think then next move will be to hire IRI to do their analytics! And the worst part of the job: you have to work with clients who don't give a damned what your reports say.

Explore other reviews about Nielsen

5.0
14 Apr 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Was a great job with great benefits

Cons

No cons at all honestly

1.0
16 Apr 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Absolutley nothing. Which is a tragedy, because Nielsen was once an absolutely great place to work. I wanted to retire here. The culture used to be great, and I really loved being a part of this place. I loved my team, my management, and the people. Then along came the current CEO who is the classic example of a person who knows the cost of everything, but the value of nothing. He took over and ran the company full speed ahead in to the iceberg. And to try and save the sinking ship, he laid off literally thousands of highly experienced, highly trained, and highly engaged people to replace them with fresh overseas hires who know nothing about the company and expect them to be trained from the ground up to replace literally centuries of collective expererience and client relations. It's a disaster. This CEO shouldn't be trusted to run a lemonade stand.

Cons

Everything. Pay, job security, culture, management. Nothing is good here anymore. Don't take a job here unless you are truly desperate. And even then, it should only be as a stop-gap until you can find something else.

5
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