Pros
IHS is a good place for a long-term middle management (manager) and below (analyst) career. If you're interested in keeping your head down, earning a decent but not outstanding salary, and collecting a paycheck, you've come to the right place. If you're ambitious, dream of continuous advancement and desire an opportunity to work in other countries or offices, then this isn't the company for you. And if you're female and have those same ambitions, definitely look elsewhere. Depending on your supervisor, there is usually a good amount of flexibility in hours as long as you are serving your clients; but you are expected to be on email 24/7 regardless of your pay scale. Negotiate at the beginning of your hire as pay raises are usually 2-3% annually at best. I had to fight hard to get 5% for a direct report who was outstanding one year in particular, capping off 7 years of excellent work. Benefits are pretty good and stock options can be rewarding, especially if you're on the "other" list - those compensated heavily in stock. If you're a particularly clever political animal, you'll do well here. With all of the acquisitions, it is a continuous minefield of change. and so your ability to navigate will be challenged, catnip for political players but misery for others.
Cons
Make no mistake, IHS is not a gender-neutral workplace. Just look at the leadership team - 2 of 11 are female and unlike many companies, that ratio permeates throughout, it doesn't increase as the funnel widens. There are a handful of female directors, but it's nearly impossible for a female to be promoted above that level so extremely difficult for an analyst to rise to a management position. There are very few female managing directors, and based on discussions with former employees, most were paid 20-30% less than male counterparts. Considering it's difficult enough to move up at IHS, adding in gender to the mix and most females can be assured of a long, slow, potentially very unproductive grind up the corporate ladder to middle management at best. IHS' style of growth by acquisition means there is a continuous stream of newly acquired talent coming into compete with you for your job, and there is no advantage to being an existing IHS employee. In fact, the newly acquired company sometimes will completely overwhelm the incumbent IHS division and the new employees will be running the division before you know it. In the last six years, in my experience, more existing IHS employees were laid off than newly acquired, excluding shared services (see below). The leadership team is often blinded by the shiny new objects rather than the tried and true. Management of divisions is often remote, so directors and VP's are often woefully out of touch with the sentiments of local offices, resulting in promotions of ill-equipped colleagues and redundancies of those actually doing the work. Decisions are made based on the opinion of a few people canny enough to have the ear of the remote manager. Managers see no issue with taking credit for new ideas or implementing new strategies without recognizing the original source. Speaking of redundancies, these are done in secret with no communication from managers. One day the person next to you is sitting at his or her desk, and the next day they're gone and there is no official information from management. This secrecy extends far up the management chain, and the entire leadership team is not briefed on the list of redundancies, even when that list includes very senior or high-profile individuals. Considering the company framework is about matrices and limiting silos, this is counterproductive, but telling. If your company is being acquired, and you work in accounting, HR, ops, or other "shared services," do start looking immediately. You'll have your job for about a year and then your tasks will be folded into the existing shared services division of IHS. I've seen it happen many times during my tenure.