Avoid If Possible - Graduate Trainee FDM Group Employee Review

1.0
10 Mar 2017
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

There are a only a few benefits to working with FDM, the training they provide isn't that bad, and you are provided with many opportunities for placements with large companies, getting you that much needed experience needed in today's job market!

Cons

With the pro's in mind, it's very very important to consider the various downsides to working at FDM, these include: - The Training is completely unpaid, and the work is full time, making it very difficult to find the time to work a part time job to make any form of money during your training. -Furthermore, you are forced to become "geographically flexible", you could be asked to relocate from Glasgow to London for example at short notice, and FDM will either offer you a week in a hotel, or two weeks of your rent. This is subpar considering the high costs of living somewhere like London, having likely just graduated from University and being working unpaid for 3-6 months, it's not very likely anyone has the money lying around to be able to fund this move without support from family or some other source. - On top of this, the salary is incredibly poor, you'll barely be paid graduate level salary, and this doesn't change depending on where you are placed, no matter how much higher the cost of living may end up being. - You have absolutely no choice as to where you end up placed, you'll be given an interview, most of the time at short notice, then you'll have to attend these interviews despite knowing very little as to what the job entails, as with in my case, the job I was told about, and the job I interviewed for could not be more difficult.

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FDM Group Response
9y
I’m sorry to hear that you are not enjoying your time with FDM. We are as transparent as possible in regards to our business model, which as you know is based on a training period (fully funded by FDM) followed by placements throughout the UK for a minimum of two years. Being geographically flexible is part of the agreement and we appreciate that the terms may not suit everyone, which is why there is a ‘cooling off ’ period where anyone can drop out in the first two weeks. We do try to accommodate preferences for placement where possible and, we like to encourage our consultants to join the clients as a permanent employee after the two year bond with FDM. So placing people somewhere which is not their preferred geographic location is not something FDM likes to do. That said, placement locations vary depending on client demand and therefore geographical flexibility is a requirement (which we reiterate throughout the recruitment process). If you wish to discuss anything further, please email me at Jonathan.Young@fdmgroup.com Jonathan Young - CIO

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Pros

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Cons

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1.0
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CEO approval
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Pros

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Cons

They will promise you opportunities that don't exist. The company they contract you to will promise you work that you will not be assigned. I was a Java Consultant with a masters degree in Math and certificate in full stack and I was shoved into a manual testing position that required zero coding and constantly dangled automation in front of my face. When I was asked to look at Selenium, I studied it in some of the copious amounts of downtime i had and was reprimanded during the next meeting for 'wasting company time'. I moved from Texas to New Jersey for my first position. After contracts with the company were terminated, I was pulled off my assignment only to be abruptly fired for "lack of geoflexibility" despite willingness to move to several places they do business including NYC and even Denver. There is no accountability from them as the only response they give is "the decision is final". There is no way to appeal a blatant lie. Their company has no integrity and side with business majors over people that know how chemicals and physics and electrical components work just seem like bad life decisions. They will say you can reapply but they won't hire you. They'd full of it at every angle.

4
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