MediaScience Reviews

2.7

32% would recommend to a friend

(50 total reviews)

Duane Varan

31% approve of CEO

28% positive business outlook

MediaScience has an employee rating of 2.7 out of 5 stars, based on 50 company reviews on Glassdoor which indicates that most employees have an average working experience there. The MediaScience employee rating is 27% below average for employers within the Management and consulting industry (3.7 stars).

Reviews by job title

50 reviews
1.0
3 Dec 2017

Heed the Warnings

Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

On a personal level, the people you work with are honestly one of a kind with many talents. I would give them a 5/5. On top of that, you do get to work with cool technology and see how they are used to collect data. You get a one hour lunch with many options of restaurants around you.

Cons

-The Research Assistants, along with Admin, are paid poorly. You cant live off of $12 to $15 an hour in a major city like Chicago, let alone Austin or New York. I feel that RA's should make $18/h-20/h. Senior RA's should make 20 to 22 and hour. Finally anyone above those positions should make at least 25+ an hour or $50,000 a year. Nothing to be rich off of, but at least it would make more sense and have us feel more comfortable with living wages. -You will find your self with nothing to do at times or completely overwhelmed with work, while management will take their third lunch for the day and constantly hammering you on more tasks that if you fail to complete, they will attempt to hold you accountable at any cost. -No matter how many times you address management about issues within studies, the office, dangerous participants, or about other RA's, they will just pretend to hear you and say that they will work on it. One week later when you ask them about what you talked about they would have no clue. Your opinions do not matter! -Speaking of dangerous participants, the RA's are typically left to fend for themselves. No manager will come out and try to handle a participant who might be acting up. They will pretend to never have heard about it and then apologize about it later on. -There are security camera's within the establishment, just like any other place should have. How is this a con you might ask? Well the reason why I bring this up as a con is that the cameras are used to watch the employees work, come in and out from lunch, and finally leave. Never in my life has the term "Big Brother is watching" been so real to me. It honestly sickens me and gives me extreme anxiety. -Management will do what they can to pin any issue on you. Even if you have physical evidence for your innocence or have a good excuse as to why you have made a mistake, they will still do their best to pin the issues on one individual, besides themselves, or just let the issue go while holding that individual as a suspect for months on end until they make another mistake. -The office has a clique vibe to it. The people are not bad, but if you do not fit into a specific social group, or are socially awkward, you might face isolation for a while until people warm up to you. -Finally you have the nepotism. Oh the sweet and savory nepotism! You can be an employee with the company for 3 years, know all the in's and out's of the job, have a strong background within research, have your own work published, majored with high honors, and have a degree within a research intensive field, but fail to be promoted because someone else was more likable, social, maybe more agreeable with management, and who has a degree with in a field of study that has no experience within research. I have been waking up every single day dreading to go to work, feeling depressed, gaining weight, finding it impossible to stay motivated to get a check, feeling completely anxious when walking into the door not knowing what to expect from participants, study set up, or disciplinary action that is not deserved. You can see the toll that this company has on the physical and mental health of the employees. Its such a shame to see great people being used and abused and have their potential go to waste. I want to love this place, but I just can't.

1.0
28 Nov 2017

It is not worth it.

Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Office is located downtown near the red and blue lines with your coworkers are great people.

Cons

Pay is absolutely abysmal: RA’s pay starts at $14. Admin is paid $12 with reception manager making the exact same as a new RA. Admin are expected to do as much, if not more than RAs (RAs can have a lot of free time to do nothing). There is a huge imbalance in the amount of work required of you and how much you will be paid. This company would rather spend money on TV’s in a back hallway facing the street (in a lab on the 3rd floor) . The pay would be forgivable if they treated their employees even decently well. One of the biggest problems is that the higher ups have little to no experience or education in business management. So the most basic aspects of management are way over their heads from employee moral to labor laws. This would explain the incredibly high turnover and generally low moral for jobs that should be relatively easy. Of course, they don’t care about the high turnover or the cost associated with having to retrain employees every few months. They like to tell new hires that most people working here are students but that is a lie to justify the high turnover. The reality is that everyone here has at least a Bachelor’s degree (which management forgets on a near daily basis) Their fix for the low morale was a “Superstar Award” with it becoming a popularity contest that ultimately hurts morale. The nepotism is made worse by the fact that everyone in upper management is too much of a coward to actually do anything about very serious issues. The handbook mentions they have an open door policy but that is a trap. Bring up serious issues with management and at best they will sweep it under the rug unless they don’t like you then they will give you lower scores on your performance review . Promotions are made almost entirely based favoritism with many qualified candidates being over looked do to whether they are liked or not a single individual in management likes them (even if the person making that decision is never in this particular office or knows what is going on). Speaking of the handbook, most of it either only applies to the Austin office or is false. They mention a discounted gym membership that has never existed at their other locations. Parking also only applies to Austin. The gym membership that is promised in the handbook and job offer has never existed at this location. Handbook says you are not required to take an hour lunch but they will count the full hour if it comes to overtime. Instead of counting the hours that you actually work (which you need to clock out for), they will just pay you under the assumption that you took a full hour. Been busy all week so you are only about to take a 30 minute lunch each day and they ask you to come in for another 5 hours? Don’t expect to be paid overtime. The handbook mentions safety and security rules but they do not exist even though it has been brought to their attention on multiple occasions. If a hostile person threatens to come down to the lab, you are on your own if it is after 4:30 or a weekend. Should probably note that everyone is required to work one day on the weekend except management regardless of need.. Outside of that the policy and rules change to suit their whims for that particular week. Outside of normal business hours of Mon-Fri between 8:30AM -4:30PM it is almost impossible to get a hold of management (who the only ones that are officially salaried) Even during those hours management is little help with them either offering to help before walking away or making some excuse why they cannot help. That does not stop them from giving warnings to employees for even minor mistakes that are inevitable when dealing with when dealing with massive amount of data with very little staff. Every problem in this company can be traced back to the management in this company company having too big of an ego. They threaten to fire you when you are unable to get in cause the elevator is locked or punish you because you didn't smile at them once when you were busy doing something.

1.0
3 Oct 2022

Don’t do it

Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

There was flexibility, coworkers were amazing. That’s all

Cons

-Everything. It’s already been said but the stress of working at a place that not only overworks you but also underpays you and continues to ask more of you while it provides you with ways to maintain sustainability throughout is a disgusting workplace model and a great way to make enemies! -Sexual harassment, enacted by Supervisors to IT directors up to CEO, directed towards lower RAs has happened, is very apparent, and will not change (despite several reports being made) due to all of them being buddies and keeping the ‘guy code’ in check to keep saving face within the company. Those who’ve made reports have been let go immediately while those who crossed the lines have remained under protection. -While these offices are diverse, racial discrimination is very aggressive/violent at these offices. The firing of Black staff has occurred on several occasions, often completely out of left field, when higher-ups have decided they no longer see them as ‘profitable’ to the company. Imagine firing the HR manager at the end of their shift and not replacing them for 2 years after the fact. A company that has 3 locations, not having HR across any of them for 2+ years? Negligence doesn’t come CLOSE to describing the legal ramifications of that decision. -There has been no change, no progress, no growth throughout the time spent here. Unless you’re a Man OR you’re attractive to the CEO, you will not be promoted for any roles or even looked at for anything other than an accessory to the CEO for clients to gawk at when they come for tours at the office, plastered with TVs littered with data that’s been completely fabricated and baseless and, honestly, very representative of the company model as a whole. Please stay away from this place. It will never be worth it for the money. You can find a remote job that’s going to give you more peace of mind and less headache. And if you’re asking yourself ‘they must be exaggerating, why are there good reviews here then?’ It’s because upper management told/bribed lower staff members to write positive reviews to overshadow the negative ones that have been posted consistently since the conception of this company. So, tell me Reader, which reviews are you taking to heart? Whichever one’s they are, be sure to mark them as ‘Helpful’ so others can stay informed!

Viewing 1 - 3 of 50 Reviews

Glassdoor has 56 MediaScience reviews submitted anonymously by MediaScience employees. Read employee reviews and ratings on Glassdoor to decide if MediaScience is right for you.