S-RM Reviews

I worked at S-RM only 4 weeks, even though the environment seems nice, friendly and the company gives the impression of caring about its employees, they do not. I was recruited by the company 3 months before the starting date for my position. I was very positive about the company and excited to start working as analyst. I moved from another country for this job with the prospect of having 3 months of probation and an open-ended contract. After I arrived, other new joiners and I started a 4-week training. We were not told anything about the training in advance, only on our first day there. The training itself was very useful and interesting, explaining everything about the company, competitors, the job etc. However, we were not given much work on which to be evaluated. Most of the time, it was merely listening to presentations from senior employees. We were not told the training was evaluative in nature, even though we were given feedback sometimes. Actually, most of the feedback we received was positive and I personally was told that there was not any problem with me or the group, and that they were expecting us to do a good job once terminated the training and started proper work by joining the teams. On the last day of training however, completely unexpectedly, myself and other employees from the training (almost half of the group of “trainees”), were gathered all together in one room at the same time (not a great hr practice!!) and asked to leave immediately because “our skills did not fit the company’s requirement”. We were not even given the time to join the team and start working, nor we were previously told that anything was not going well during the training. The company promotes values of transparency and honesty, and pretends to be fair to its employees, but surely it has not been to me, especially since I decided to move from another country (with all the hassle deriving from committing to a flat contract etc.) specifically for this job and then was only given 4 weeks (of which barely 2 when we actually produced some research and writing) during which i was never given real opportunities to prove how I would work in the team since i was kicked out before joining it. FYI, I have previous work experience in big companies and international organizations, a 1st class master's from a top-tier university and speak several languages. I feel like i should have been given the possibility to prove my skills. Therefore, I would advice to anyone before joining S-RM to think twice, to consider that you might be let go suddenly and unexpectedly, without even been given the time to work. My impression is that the company acts like a mature, big consultancy firm but in reality it is far from it, especially on the management side. It should have been clearer on their intentions, more honest during the training and more considerate when firing people.

S-RM does not compensate senior women comparably to its men, and I left the company mainly because of this. For context, I was promoted five times in six years, and received excellent performance ratings in every review. My performance was not a limiting factor in my compensation. And yet: I took over management of S-RM's US intelligence clients from a man with a similar level of experience and responsibilities. I was paid 25% less. Over the next year, my work growing these client relationships resulted in doubling our US revenue. At my last performance review I asked for a 20% raise. I was given 14%. I resigned soon after. My role has been taken over by another man with a similar level of experience and responsibilities. He is, again, being paid over 25% more than what I was making by the time I left. There are significant seniority and wage gaps between men, and every other demographic, at S-RM. Its executive leadership, heads of every geographic region (Americas/EMEA/APAC), and heads of almost every practice area are almost exclusively white and male. The firm made steps toward transparency by providing some data to employees about salary bands for junior and mid-level roles. But as of the time I resigned, no salary transparency at senior levels was provided to directors. This leaves the women and minorities who do make it to a senior level with limited data to understand whether - and how substantially - they are being undercompensated for equal work.