Pros
- The company puts out meaningful products that has helped millions of people with their finances - The actual workers - designers, writers, developers, sales people, content producers - are extremely talented and people of high character. I never felt like I was working with someone who was just filling a seat. Every person I interacted with outside of management was extremely talented yet humble for their age, and easily could find work anywhere. - You might win the team selection lottery and end up on a good team with great leaders who shield you from some of the ugliness that goes on in other parts of the company. - You are love-bombed twice a year with company events that are very much over the top - It is extremely rare to work overtime at the building. You almost always get to go home at your pre-selected end-of-day time. Working on the weekend is also very rare, but this might vary by role and department. - Workers have access to modern tools to get their job done.
Cons
- "Core Values" are preached about constantly, but are inconsistently enforced. Revenue impact and position buy you a lot of "grace" - The "no gossip" policy might have been good in theory years ago. It prevented communication that tends to tear down relationships, however, it discourages people low in the org chart from seeing if their concerns are merited. The only person they can talk to, without fear of termination, is someone up the org chart. It turns out this policy extends to family as well - if your spouse publicly questions something the company is doing, expect to be talked to about it. People have been terminated because of something their spouse said. - Benefits are horrible, especially the health insurance. I didn't realize this until I left and got significantly better coverage with my new employer for less than a quarter of the cost. Combined with the pay cut that I took to work here, my total compensation took a huge hit. Thankfully, I found better pay and better benefits elsewhere. You will be on your own for dental or vision benefits, and a lot of inexpensive add-ons that you might find at other places (ex: supplemental life, AD&D) are also not offered. All of those go against what the CEO preaches on-air. But hey, at least they pay for your $60 Costco membership. "Free lunch" is a thing of the past, and the "subsidized" lunch at the café isn't any cheaper than eating out. - There is a notable lack of diversity. The CEO will say "Look at all of these women executives", or point to the racial diversity among the handful of speakers. The actual staff (excluding food service and building services) has very little ethnic diversity - overall the company is close to 95% white. Some departments are very heavily male dominated, but that, at least ,has started to improve in the past few years. Overall the company is about 60/40 M/F. - Employees are expected to follow "traditional Judeo-Christian values", especially when it comes to marriage. People who sleep with someone who are not their opposite-sex spouse have been terminated, with some high level exceptions ("grace"). - The company teaches other companies through its leadership products to have retained earnings so they can handle downturns in the economy. But during the pandemic, it felt like Ramsey Solutions didn't practice what it preached. They even talked about this publicly in videos put out on social: pause profit sharing, ask employees to skip a paycheck, push accounts payable as far back as the contract allows, to name a few. - The CEO has said in the past "If you disagree with how we are handling [whatever], you need to leave.". It has been said many, many times in 2020, especially around COVID. If you have a difference of opinion, you need to take it to your leader, and risk being asked "Do you distrust the leadership?" which could be lead to your being asked to leave. You can't talk to your teammates about your concerns ("no gossip"), and if your spouse disagrees publicly with how the company is handling things, you will get a talking to (or worse) about that as well. - Don't expect to work remotely. It was allowed for a few weeks at the start of the pandemic, and a handful of people have been allowed to continue to work from home on occasion since then. In general, the CEO despises remote work. The type of cult ure he wants to maintain is not possible if the team is not under the same roof. - Every year there is a "best place to work" survey we fill out. Though I never felt pressured to lie, it was strongly communicated every year that it was not a place to air one's grievances. I've worked at other "best places to work", and none ever pressured us as much as Ramsey Solutions did to not answer negatively. - Spouses are interviewed late in the interview process. If they later choose to join one of the private social groups for spouses, realize that they are administered by part of the company's social media team and someone from HR. If your spouse attempts to say something negative (gossip, which will be blocked my the mods), it might come back to bite you. - There is a strong us-versus-them mentality, where "them" is anyone that disagrees with the CEO and operating board. That includes (but is not limited to) other employers out there, who are described as being horrible, or even the "crazy spouses" who disagree with anything about the company. - The company exhibits many signs of a "High-Control Group"
