IBM: Brief Company Overview

International Business Machines, better known as IBM, is one of the worlds largest technology companies, currently ranking at number twenty in the fortune five-hundred. IBM was founded by Thomas J. Watson, not from scratch, but through the merging of three, already prominent, computer companies. IBM distinguished itself, not only through selling products, but primarily through research and development. IBM is currently one of the forerunners in the burgeoning field of internet clouds.

Employee satisfaction at IBM is fairly average at 68%. Similar companies generally rank from 50% - 85%, with the most being between 65% and 73% (“CEO Pay”). Employee satisfaction has to take many factors into account including pay, benefits, bosses and current job situation. IBM generally has competitive pay and benefits and, while not at the highest end on these subjects, IBM is in the upper half. The average pay at IBM is 87,700.00 and most positions have a variety of benefits include health, dental and vacation time. The satisfaction of an employee can vary greatly depending on the area in which they work, the quality of their boss and the quality of their current situation. These factors are often stronger than basic factors of pay and benefits. For example, in the sales department at IBM, an employees evaluation is done solely based on how much they sell. If an employee was assigned to sell to Kodak, a film company, during the 2013 business year, they would be in a very poor situation, since Kodak was making very little money that year, and ended up going bankrupt in the fall. Being in a situation like this could be very difficult and stressful for an employee and certainly hurt employee satisfaction. Similarly, if an employee had a boss that w...

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...ople who have to coordinate with others in different countries. Specific teams will often have members in China, the US and Canada. These people will rarely ever meet face-to-face and do most of their business online or over the phone. This often results in late nights when conferencing with Japan and can easily lead to miscommunication and mistakes which can impact employee satisfaction.

In the end, IBM is very much like most large software companies. It does not have the employee satisfaction ratings of a young, hip start-up such as Google, but it's ratings are within the average range and have remained very consistent for decades. The pay, compensation and benefits that the company provides for its employees is on the higher side of average, but still within that range. The bureaucracy at IBM is also fairly average, following the same setup as most organizations.