McAfee Reviews

Current Employee – been working at McAfee full-time for more than 10 years

Pros – Great new office, close teamwork within R&D across the globe.

Cons – Career progression could be improved.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm optimistic about the outlook for this company

Current Employee – been working at McAfee full-time

Pros – Large number of opportunities within the company. Very supportive staff

Cons – Lack of planning, focus on meeting quarterly targets

Advice to Senior Management – Increase inhouse training for the professional service teams

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm optimistic about the outlook for this company

Former Employee – worked at McAfee for more than 3 years

Pros – - People are genuinely collaborative and caring
- Some great products
- A clear technical strategy

Cons – - The clear technical strategy is unreachable without a significant investment in additional technical staff
- Little consideration given for work/life balance
- Very low morale

Advice to Senior Management – Reign in the strategy of acquisition, or factor into it the need to increase the sales + technical resources needed turn acquisitions into successful revenue generators without neglecting the existing portfolio of products.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company

Current Employee – been working at McAfee part-time for more than a year

Pros – nice people make it a good work place

Cons – low pay is a bit of a problem

Advice to Senior Management – keep it the way it is

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm optimistic about the outlook for this company

Former Employee – worked at McAfee full-time for more than a year

Pros – Good technology that sells itself

Cons – Bad management, high staff turnover, lack of internal communication

Advice to Senior Management – Sort yourselves out, respect your staff, focus on empowering your staff

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company

Former Employee – worked at McAfee full-time for more than a year

Pros – Great brand credibility, especially being part of Intel!

Cons – Extremely poor senior leadership...VP level....absolutely no accountability, no vision, political nightmare, case of biding time and passing the buck on....

Advice to Senior Management – They should definitely re-introduce a skip level meeting into the mix if they want to retain good talent....most good employees are staying back purely on the strength of the brand....but the organisation is definitely going downhill if they continue their lack of focus on results and instead motivate employees to become political weasels!

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company

Former Employee – worked at McAfee full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – * lots of projects (especially middle-sized and small) being worked on;
* constant need for new ideas, new approaches;
* hard work is usually noticed at the middle management level;
* scope to earn a reputation;
* scope to push yourself;
* being given interesting technical problems to solve is quite common;
* there are very good technical people around (although the number/ratio is decreasing);
* work environment is quite friendly and informal;

Cons – * sales-oriented organisation: engineering is a division that most people running the company would get rid of, given half the chance (and that translates into budget decisions, lack of training, etc.);
* projects are planned badly, resulting in common (unpaid) overtime, weekend work, etc.;
* "waterfall" project planning model is everywhere, but teams are expected to work "within it" in an agile manner (there's an obvious conflict in this approach, palpable on the daily work routine more often than not);
* concentration of "weasels" is increasing;
* the "cool" projects are a commodity, and it's usually given to office-politics-focused people (with a few technically able employees added to the team, as otherwise nothing would get done);
* very good technical people increasingly being demotivated, and that having a domino effect on employee morale;
* there is an unhealthy number of office-politics-focused people, which ruins the experience for those around them;
* some people are undeservedly appreciated (especially those into office politics), and can get away with things that any other "mortal" would not, and can get assigned to work on the cool projects for no technical reason;
* sometimes people are hired just to fill in positions, and the "least bad" is offered the job (but no courage/incentive to avoid hiring people that aren't good enough);
* employee feedback is only acted upon "infrastructural" stuff, but the heavy politics are an impediment to do anything else on other aspects;
* middle management is powerless (probably not an uncommon trait in the current corporate world), and are too afraid to challenge anything, almost always choosing to ignore feedback from employees;

Advice to Senior Management – * work on the corporate culture: it's not good for people working in engineering;
* read the "cons" comments above, and do something about it, before the good people continue leaving the company;
* encourage middle management to engage with direct reports, and be prepared to listen and act on the feedback received;
* give managers management training;
* get rid of bad managers (listen to all employees feedback, or good luck spotting the "bad managers" yourselves);
* be prepared to pay for good technical people, and improve the hiring process (to be able to better tell who's good and who's just "talking the talk");

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at McAfee

Pros – Company is really looking after its employees. Management is keen to listen and change. Training can be offered is relevant.

Cons – Working environment at this particular site is not so good. Industrial area, not many places to go at lunch. Teams spread across many small houses, less chance to communicate across teams.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at McAfee

Pros – Flexible working hours
Working with smart people and good technologies

Cons – Once you join don't expect your salary to rise by much no matter how good you are. After a couple of years other companies are more competitive which makes it very tempting to leave.
Very inexperienced people managers don't know how to treat employees and keep moral high.
Constant fire fighting and a short term view on everything.
Constant reorgs make people less productive.
Experience is not valued.

Advice to Senior Management – Long term decisions about structure of teams and policy need to be taken and stuck to. Constant changes make people want to give up. It takes time for an organisation to settle and become fully productive. If you keep changing and moving it will never get there.
Pay your employees what they are worth. How much will it cost to hire and train a replacement? Again a longer term view needed!!

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at McAfee

Pros – Very human centric environment. Flexitime and flexible attitudes to work.

Cons – Easy to stagnate here. No career development. No training. No salary raises for 2 years.

Advice to Senior Management – Wake up and stop idolising the shareholders.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend