Pros
- If you have to take this job (and that should be a last resort), it can be decent work experience. Know that you will be mistreated, overworked, and under compensated. But if you keep your head down and make it to as close to a year as possible (most don't), then you will have some decent experience to leverage into a much better job. Take the experience and run as soon as possible. - The best thing about this firm is the associate attorneys. When possible, work directly for them. They will have your best interests in mind and help you develop professionally. They are honestly great people. - The rest of the support staff are great too.
Cons
This job will wear you down until you forget what normal employment looks like. You will be abused and overworked, while simultaneously being asked why you aren’t working even longer hours. In return you are under paid with few benefits. There is a reason that there is such high turnover. Some have tried to stick it out in the hopes it gets better…it doesn’t. A few specific cons to be aware of: Management: - Extremely poor upper and middle management. Management fails to take ownership of its own work and will throw anyone and everyone under the bus to get ahead. Any good managers are quickly forced out leaving people that are rude, condescending, two-faced, and petty. This has led to extraordinarily high turnover of PRS staff. Most PRS staff do not make it a full year. - More specifically, managers do not communicate with each other about workloads and give unrealistic amounts of work to the PRS staff. They then berate you for not working fast enough or long enough hours and make even the smallest mistakes into huge deals. They also blame their own mistakes on their subordinates in order to not look bad to attorneys. Management has an “us v. them” mentality that weakens the entire unit. - Managers are not held accountable for their actions. Employees who bring up issues are then treated worse by the managers. Directors are incapable or unwilling to address the issues. They make up nonsensical excuses like it being a "generational" or "cultural" issue. - This is not a job you can succeed at. The best you can hope to do is not be the current punching bag. Benefits: - Only 10 vacation days a year that accrue very slowly. - There is no true healthcare. Only a high deductible HSA. - There is no 401k until you have been there over a year. Again, few make it that long. - Pay is under market. They over exaggerate the amount of money a PRS makes by including overtime pay. However, overtime is not optional, and it is not a benefit. They require very long hours and only pay the minimum they are required to pay by law for the hours worked by the employee. Directors also continuously promise raises and good bonuses at the end of the year that fail to materialize. - At the very least, you will work very long hours for 1/3 of the year (4 months). This can be longer in election years. Everything you need to know about this firm can be witnessed on this Glassdoor page. There are honest and sincere reviews that implore the management to make a change. In response, management creates fake reviews to artificially push up the companies rating instead of actually addressing the very real problems of harassment and abuse. In fact, there will probably be a few 5-star reviews in response to this one. Notice the good reviews are from long term employees (management) and are overly positive and glowing. Honest reviews would at least acknowledge the obvious flaws.