registered nurse

postdoctoral fellow

senior research associate

staff scientist

research associate

City of Hope

pros - Pay as they are above market rate and their research that they do for cancer and diabetes. 

Cons - if you are looking to start a career here with patient access, the culture is rooted with nepotism. If you start in an entry level position, it will be challenging for you to move laterally or upwards unless you know someone.  A few staff have verbatim told me they got the position because they knew someone from upper management. I have known temp staff who have been there for years only to passed on for a permanent positions due to nepotism. Guess work qualifications and experience don’t apply here? “Life isn’t about what you know but who you know”.

Their business operations are constantly changing with no organization. No strategic planning implemented that they stick to so expect haphazard-ness when it comes them trying to “improve” their processes. Pilots upon pilots that never finish or lead to no where. Patients are the one are at loss because they suffer from poor strategic planning and little to no vision with these pilots. Long wait times, poorly trained staff....They have been in operations for 100 years and yet they have no structure with their business operations to show for it. It is no easy feat since they have to keep the show running.
I worked in the contact center for a year and their business lines were skewed with their patient phone line. I would be servicing and trouble shooting calls from vendors while our patient service lines suffered; we were blamed for not meeting numbers due to their lack of organization with their phone lines. Management is always “reacting” instead of being proactive. It is a freaking call center. Your job as a manager is to ensure it is always staffed. Good clear example of not being pro active; two of my co workers have gave them plenty advance notice of leaving the company and their positions were never filled after 9 months. Morale and staff volume declined and our call volumes increased. 9 months and no new staff? There must be an ulterior motive because that is clear insubordination. No interview or job postings to fill those positions ever came about. I  was hired to schedule and assist patients which is strictly stated in my job description (they have another job title to handle business related calls but yet here we are receiving calls routed to us for non related patient issues 8 hours a day. I was never informed or “trained” to answer these call types. Clear example, call for our purchasing department was routed to our patient line only to have the vendor irate  and  screaming at me because they could not get a hold of someone. Totally not an isolated issue but a great example of their lack of understanding of the call types we should not be servicing since we are the PATIENT CALL CENTER.  My peers would provide feedback all day long about these non patient related call types so if you multiply that by how many staff are intercepting calls, then this is why our service levels for PATIENT care is never met! Fix your phone lines and systems! My job duties were to assist patients with scheduling. No training was even implemented when I was hired and up until I left the organization. Management will not support you and will not listen to your feed back for service opportunities to improve patient access and care because they are there to do the bare minimal. Speaking of management, it has been a revolving door. That speaks volumes in itself. We’ve had about 6 management who left the organization altogether in a span of 12 months. How are they supposed to gain any traction on improvement of their business when there is a constant revolving door? To advocate real change requires extra work, that will not be coming from upper management. If you bring up service opportunities to them (I didn’t use the word failure) with solutions, you will be labeled as negative. That is just a cop out for them to not do the extra work to improve their business. They’re there to do the bare minimum and collect checks. The line of work is monotonous (this is obvious statement, it’s a call center). Expect a lot of complaints from irate patients due to service opportunities. This will wear anyone down after a few days. There is also a quality department to measure agents when this department should not have been implemented yet as they didn’t even have training and processes down first.  There should be 3 components and they chose the easiest one to fill. Great allocation of resources. (I see a pattern here). That requires work and understanding of how to assist our patient scheduling, which none of them are qualified to do. So they’re working backwards now? Rating your staff when you haven’t even provided real training from this work optimization department? Isn’t that setting your staff up for failure with no training department implemented? It must be nice for them to learn as they go because that’s what you’ll be doing at the contact center. This place is the twilight zone.  

If you are here to get a check while losing your sanity and looking to for an escape route in 2 weeks than this job is for you. 


Team work and trust are important. I have done my job efficiently and even over my job description. Management will only listen to seniority staffs or higher title. They gave more duties to you as time went by, be sure you meet the timelines or not make any error, or else, they will make it a big and disregard of your 99% error free achievement/works. City of Hope now required staffs who working at Duarte Campus need to take the company shuttle park at Irwindale Speedway, you are very close contact to the person sits in front/behind you the seat not even 4 ft away, and you need to wait for the shuttle to be full seated prior the shuttle will depart take you to the campus. I am glad that my work location does not need to take shuttle, even it does, I left this hospital prior the shuttle effective date September.  For the raise, their minimum raise is 3% yearly, if you happen to work for a good manager, they will give you higher raise based on your good work performance, however, my manager only gave us 3% yearly no matter how many works you have done/ how wonderful of your work achievement.  Credentialing is a challenging/critical position that you need to be extra detail/error free and you also need to obtain everything from the practitioners on time, sometimes, it's not based on your control, you are relying on 3rd party like insurance company or practitioners to respond. If you think you can step your foot in COH first then transfer later, don't expect to high. HR is very selective that unless you have a strong experiences related to the position you applying or if you know someone from other department, it might be higher chance for you to transfer/grow.  City of Hope is good to patients, no doubt on this, but to employees I would say you better apply somewhere else could get higher pay than here, especially management mostly like to start with your salary a little over the minimum start pay, not going to give you very high salary, unless you have over 5 years or 10 years experiences or if you have extremely good personal relationship.  Of course, when you first start in any place, everyone is mostly nice to you, but as time goes by, you will see how this Department treats you like not being valued.  They will not retain you or invest on you regardless you have done most great job in this Department. This is the reason why I felt no future/hope in this hospital - they mostly hire senior levels or software/IT system knowledge, call center, or assistant/secretary that required you to take minutes.  I am now working at another company better pay and benefit than here and higher title.  I was working at Irwindale, but Duarte Campus medical staff office is the same culture, my friend advised me even worst than Irwindale office.  Duarte Campus medical staff office just came a new analyst transferred from Irwindale campus and good luck on dealing with her. The management over there listens to her a lot a very bossy/demanding person, if you work any position over Duarte campus this office, good luck.   We felt at ease that she transferred out to our department.

Firstly, I have been an employee for more than 10 years. For the first 7+ years, I absolutely loved my job. The work was fast paced, on the cutting edge of new therapies, and my PIs were constantly expanding my role as I grew. They pushed for growth, without being overbearing. They were in the lab every day, providing support and training, but then stepped back once you were deemed competent. They provided an amazing culture that still allowed for work life balance. And, apparently, they protected us employees from the changing culture that was happening in the upper levels of management. 

When they retired, our lab duties shifted to accommodate their losses, which was fine initially. However, the buffer was lost and we were tossed head first into a cesspool of politics, favoritism, non-compliance and hostility. We were floored by the responses we received when reporting compliance breaches and conflicts of interest. We have been labeled as "problems" and "impeding other PIs research" when we question the safety and/or ethics. Other employees have reached out with concern due to the gossip that is being spread around campus about us.  And HR, Compliance and other regulatory entities have no teeth to enforce regulations. They simply concede to the upper management and PI's wishes.

They keep hiring "Directors" and "Managers" without any experience in the fields they are meant to direct, or employees left to report to them. It has become a dysfunctional mess of egos, with little care for those that perform the actual work on a daily basis. 

2 years ago, I would have recommended this place to anyone looking for work. I know people who have received amazing care as patients and I loved being a part of that. Now, I would not send my worst enemy here.

I am still trying to make changes from the inside because I have so many years invested and believe in the importance of the work that I do. However, I have little hope that my voice will hold water as it is being drowned out by others in upper management.

I have out-patient clinic two days a week and I see patients for complications from their chemotherapy and manage their chronic pain. I assess them holistically and obtain consults as needed. I prepare patients for acepting hospice and remain available for emotional and spiritual support.
I maintain a phone triage for all patients in our pain and palliative care practice for adjustng medications, assisting with concerns, and evaluating need to come to the hospital for examination.
I work with an interventional pain specialist and see the patients in the greatest pain unresponsive to traditinal therapy. I arrange intrathecal pain pump placements, and provide reprogramming and refills.
I have learned how poorly trained nurses are when caring for a dying patient. As part of my DNP program I developed an acronym organized pocket tool to prompt nurses on the most common needs of the dying it is called CARES (Comfort, Airway, Restlessness, Emotional support, and Self-Care). I want to improve hospital based care to be more in-tune with what Hospice provides.
My co-workers and management are all very supportive and easy to work with.
The hardest part of my job is to transfer care to Hospice and cease all involvement with patient's and families that I worked closely with for a year or longer. I seem to want more direct involvement in the teaching and training of staff on care of the dying.
The most enjoyable part of my job is my patients. I am so humbled by their courage and strength. I like feeling I make a difference and feel providing quality of life must be a primary focus.

Working on the clinic side and after meeting and working with quite a few other fellow staff members, technicians and pharmacists, at many different locations, everyone seems to hold the same thoughts when it comes to working at these sites. The work itself is fine. Be it from compounding, ordering, restocking to pharmacists verifying and checking but the opinions about management remains consistent. There are a few main managers that each have a region under them but they do not work on site. One is known for a great lack of communication and will not respond to messages if not in the company's best interest. They will also promise per diem staff hours but will eventually fall short of that promise - leading to those staff members having to find an additional job. Another one has much better communication but is seemingly kind and professional in their persona but their words and actions has made staff feel undermined, uncared for, and the feeling of being treated more like a robot than a human being. The manager above them is seemingly oblivious to these actions. If management was able to actually spend time working on site at one of their busier locations, they could see first-hand what their employees are going through and not through a computer screen. Hopefully that would create more of an understanding for the employees raising concerns and that those concerns are actually valid and not fiction.

To begin with, there is a high level of micromanagement in this call center. You are expected to be clocked in exactly at your scheduled time and immediately ready to take the first call that comes in, with little room for flexibility.

A typical day can be very stressful, especially when escalation calls are needed. Support from management is limited, and it can take up to 10 minutes or more to get assistance, leaving you to handle difficult situations on your own.

Time-off flexibility is very limited. Requests are based strictly on seniority and availability, making it difficult for many employees to get time off when needed. Even when time is requested in advance, approval is not guaranteed, which can be frustrating and discouraging.

During my time at City of Hope, I felt that the focus was more on revenue than on employees or even patient care. Patients frequently call frustrated, often stating that supervisors have not returned their calls, which puts additional pressure on front-line staff.

There is also a lack of support from management. At times, it can feel like employees are blamed rather than supported, and there is a culture where coworkers may feel thrown under the bus. The most consistent support comes from fellow colleagues, not leadership.

Overall, while the role can build resilience and communication skills, the lack of flexibility, minimal support, and high-pressure environment make it a challenging place to work.


City of Hope’s mission to help patients is inspiring, but the internal management culture fails to support its own workforce. A typical day involves performing duties outside your job description with little to no formal training, then being held accountable for tasks you weren’t authorized or qualified to handle. Management lacks transparency and accountability, often leaving employees to “figure it out” without proper guidance.

While I gained experience in crisis management and learned how to stay calm under pressure, it came at the cost of being unsupported by leadership. The hardest part of the job is the micromanagement mixed with poor communication and constant shifting of expectations, often contradicting written policies.

The most enjoyable part of the job was interacting with patients and co-workers who genuinely cared. Unfortunately, leadership's focus was more on optics than actual operational support, leading to burnout and high turnover.

15 yr employee and I watched it turn from an amazing place of employment to a facility run in greed at the expense of its patients and staff!  The new chain of management treats staff as all replaceable and at times are downright abusive towards staff verbally.  Environment becomes hostile particularly when staff are overloaded and managment makes no effort to really recruit and dont bother to bring in registry and then will discipline staff that are burnt out resulting in a revolving door.  Benefits are the most expensive in the country for an employee and unless you get the most expensive one that is a PPO then you will never be treated as a patient should you need it, that’s a big one for staff to be unable to seek staff from the physicians they assist! Raises are minimal and do not keep up with rising inflation!  There are unions but they have no strength at this place that people resign instead of going to the union.  Entire leadership needs an overhaul! Staff and physicians are amazing and caring and management needs to spend a day with our patients to learn something about compassion and empathy instead of how to ensure they get their bonuses 

Let me start off with the biggest problem, Management. Management could’ve been a lot better if they all got replaced or at least had a personality. Felt like you were working for a dictator majority of the times from the way they would order you to do things that wasn’t in your job description. Everyone of my coworkers would talk about how bad management was and some have sent complaints with no action being taken by the superiors. The union can only do so much but even then it didn’t feel like enough. They’d try to manipulate you into working overtime and made you feel guilty and ashamed for not agreeing. Attendance policy is literally a joke and has no room for natural human error. Apart from that, the job itself wasn’t too bad other than being overworked, $8 food credit was nice, cafeteria food was pretty good, coworkers were all good people. Bottom line is just that management was terrible. Another example was the fact that management was talking down on a new member of management in Spanish so that he couldn’t understand them. Tell me that’s not a toxic work environment. 

What is the best part of working at the company?
Some of the potential pts, some of the colleagues, the benefits

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
Back to back calls all day long, with only 30 seconds in between to try and get notes into the lead, not being able to get up from your desk due to interpreter calls that doubled sometimes tripled the length of the interview, management not all being on the same page, i.e. one tells you one way it is to be done, another tells you another way, and a 3rd manager tells you something entirely different, but we were held responsible for the incorrect information we received from the management team. 

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
We worked remotely, there was no work environment due to this fact.  The culture on the other hand was one of favoritism. If you were a favorite of the manager, you were able to get whatever you wanted.  Management never gave others the opportunity to try and prove they could do the "special" jobs as well.

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
Taking calls all day long, 1 day a week we had a team meeting where we all came together for training.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Registered nurse 9 salaries reported	$62.17 per hour
Postdoctoral fellow 11 salaries reported	$78,091 per year
Senior research associate 4 salaries reported	$73,250 per year
Staff scientist 4 salaries reported	$91,750 per year
Research associate 3 salaries reported	$90,000 per year

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