Sark / Sogeti Rumors Update
Here is a synopsis of the rumors and tid-bits I have heard over the last 24+ hours. Most are just speculation or things people have heard through the grape vine from people they used to work with.
- no idea on a transition time table
- Sogeti seems to offer a wider range of services including lower development jobs, DBA-ish, and more PM-ish jobs. No idea how the avg. Sark position fits in with this.
- bad health insurance plan - instead of a monthly premium, you have a mutli-thousand dollar deductible which after you reach it, the insurance pays the rest. And there is only one level of coverage (Sark had 3) and only two choices (Single or Single + others).
- they offer a Health Spending Account to help with the above (more info here)
- better 401k benefits (better matching to a higher % contributed) but I/we don't know how our current "vested amounts" will carry over to their plan
- no activities committee like Sark has (good bye cool Sark outings and less sports, etc). They may have a softball team. A couple other company events are held but clients are invited instead of family ...
- NO overtime pay (Sark did) ... if you are on a "time and materials" project and work more than 40, you get comp time. if you are on fixed price project, you get nada, but OT is discouraged. comp time is used before vacation but isn't paid out. Vacation is paid out at the end of the year. No idea yet if vacation is given as of Jan 1st, or if it is accrued. Sark was nice since we got it as of Jan.
- Similar amount of in company training and ability to expense training materials as Sark
- no idea about their policies on "beach" time (ie time between clients) ... for example if we get paid in full, what we will be doing, etc
- no idea about career paths in Sogeti, seniority carrying over, or pay scales
- I have seen that they have a St. Louis office with openings ... I have no idea how feasible it will be to get a "transfer" there in the future (give I have no idea of the transition time table) but thats promising
5 comments:
wow, not gonna lie but they sound like they kinda suck.
Can you form a regional activities committee or is it an issue of funding? I assume sark funds a lot of the stuff you guys do.
The health care plan is bull. Progressive offers like 5 or 6 options none of which have that out of pocket crap.
good luck man. A merger like that, if your rumors are true, would probably result in my looking for a new place to work.
Suppose i should email back that guy from your recruitment office and tell him I'm not so much interested anymore.
I think the only options for my health care stuff was what I enrolled in(medical, pharmacy, dental, and vision...pharmacy might be part of medical, I don't remember) and whether it was for me or for me + family. I have a copay for dental/medical visits, $15 for office, $50 for ER. Not too bad from my point of view. I don't really understand how your deductible would work. Would it work like a copay?
My company doesn't really have any kinds of activities committee. At least, not that I've noticed. There are office events, like picnics, food contests, and that kind of thing, but nothing really outside of work except softball. I'd like to maybe play some indoor soccer or something, but I'm not sure if there's much interest or how to go about setting that up.
As far as we think we understand it (remember this is {Xth-hand : x > 5}) instead of paying a monthly bill for health insurance (mine is somewhere between 30 and 50 a paycheck) and then copays at the doctor/dentist/etc .... now I wouldn't pay anything until I needed to go to the doctor, and then I would have to pay full price.
Once the total amount I paid for that year was at $X,XXX they would start paying for it instead. So basically, until you reach that amount, its like you don't have insurance.
Hopefully the plan isn't like that or at least maybe we get discounts but have to pay all of the discounted price. Also the figure I quoted was for a "family". I haven't heard what the single price might be (assuming Em got it through her employer)
If that's the way it actually works, that would suck a lot. I barely use my health insurance, so I would get very screwed by that plan. What's the point of health insurance if you can't really tell that you have it?
I am recycling this comment, so you may have seen me say this before...
Those of us who work at Microsoft are seeing this as a very positive move. I left the Solution Services group of the Chicago SARK office last summer, and have been trying to establish a stronger relationship between SARK and Microsoft since then, rather successfully too. In some locations where SARK is not well known, Sogeit is heavily used by Microsoft. So in the end, it's a win-win situation for both firms. Hope that rings true once all is said and done. My boyfriend still works at the Chicago branch so I am watching these posts closely as well. Good luck!
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