researcher

senior researcher

software engineer

research associate

project manager

Mathematica

I worked at Mathematica as a Project Assistant for several years. The Survey Operations Center does all the work in terms of getting projects up and running, managing researchers and equipment, and receiving and processing data. This department does EVERYTHING and is paid minimum wage with minimal benefits. Worst of all, there are NO OPPORTUNITIES FOR GROWTH. Even if you apply for an opportunity outside of the department, you will not receive the privilege of being looked at as an internal hire, as the rest of the company does not value the Survey Operations Center or any of its employees. You will be looked down in and passed over, even if you have the background, experience, and education. This position is the epitome of a dead end job where you will be undervalued, overworked and underpaid. Meanwhile, your colleagues in other departments will rave about how well the company treats it's employees. Progress is a part of the company's brand, but they are literally exploiting an entire department of workers and the CEO is well aware of it. I cannot stress enough that this job is NOT the place for you if you're looking for career or financial stability. If you just want a small gig while you're in school to put a little money in your pocket or something to get you out of the house as a house spouse or retiree, have at it! Just beware that management doesn't overwork you or stress you out with their ineptitude and lack of organization. Honestly, with the pay being as low as it is, you would be better off working as an Uber driver or busing tables. You would probably make more money and have better peace of mind. It was not until I left that I realized I'd actually forgotten what it was like to work for a company that functions properly and values its employees.

Mathematica was a great experience. The people are friendly, the work is interesting, and they treat their employees well.
At Mathematica, you are treated as part of a team. The supervisors will not look down on you, you are an actual person to them. Your opinions are valuable to the company and getting a hold of a supervisor is not a problem. 
 They offer the flexibility of choosing when you can come in to work and the supervisors are very understanding of any issues that can interfere with you coming in to work.
 I worked as an on-call telephone interviewer, which unfortunately brings the chance of being laid-off when projects are ending or have a low amount of respondents. Luckily, I never had much of an issue with being laid off as I moved from project to project and rarely had any off time. The supervisors are well aware that people need to work and will help you if you are a hard worked. 
I would say the hardest part of the job was dealing with respondents who thought we were calling as some sort of scam and would be very adamant and rude. There is training and the supervisors are there to help. The best you can do is know your project well and address their concerns, people can tell when your not sure about yourself on the phone. 
Overall I enjoyed my time at Mathematica, and recommend people who have the chance to apply to do so.

Great company for entry-level employee, tough to get on different projects if you’re new because project directors only choose people they are familiar with that will help them win a proposal or help them look good on the project. They do not promote employees moving from department to department, although it’s OK for some to do but not others. A lot of younger people in senior roles. This company hates to train people and if you’re a person that doesn’t like to train yourself how to do things this is not a place for you. The CEO is Outspoken and always says things like some of you or children then or some of you are too young to remember or weren’t even born then. They tell you you can decide what you want to work on and if you don’t work on that project you can leave but what they don’t tell you is that it is frowned upon to do that. This is not a company I would recommend especially if you don’t know anyone. The company is heavily based on your networking success. If you aren’t able to do a lot of but kissing then you will not be successful here. The company is also moving to focus on roles that are more technically involved so if you are not  able to code in sequel it can be challenging. They don’t tell you you can get stuck on a project managing a project for up to three years before you’re able to move to another project. They don’t tell you when you come in exactly what you’ll be doing. You have to sit and wait for weeks to months to get on the project that you may or may not like and once you’re there or you’re stuck . 

Overall not a terrible place to work but everything is so disorganized, it's very easy to feel burn out here. 

Billability is important here but it's tough to get onto some projects. Your success here is dependent on how well you can network and put yourself out there with fellow staff and project leaders in order to be accepted or recognized into certain projects. Workload varies from having nothing to do all day to being slammed with last minute proposals and other deadlines at once. There is very little micro managing here but management tends to be all over the place just as well. This company does not have any effective training program and you will be stuck trying to figure things out on your own. The longer you're here, the more you start to realize how many new people are in leadership roles and how many people don't actually know what they're doing. Very poor communication between departments and staff. Mostly due to many people being poorly trained at what they are doing and no clear standard approach to how and when certain tasks get done. 

Lots of old tech, applications, and management platforms that would benefit greatly by being consolidated so it's not so difficult to keep track of everything. 

The company needs serious restructuring and reorganization. 

Overall, it was a great company. Took care of its employees. Managers and co-workers (most of them) were willing to help you out. Bagel Fridays. Generous PTO. Employee-owned company, so you had your 401k with company match, plus stock options. You were able to do well for yourself there.

Took a turn for the worse around 2016-2017. At the Princeton location, you started to see good talent and good people leaving left and right. Some new employees that came in did not absorb MPR's culture - they tried to hijack it and turn it into a vision of culture that they wanted. Sometimes felt forced to "have fun" there, which comes off as fake and insincere. Re-orgs and information were kept under wraps, and it became more and more corporate by the day. Too many people took advantage of the work-from-home option, and now offices and floors look deserted. The first few years for me were great. The last couple of years left a lot to be desired. Regardless of all that, it was still the best company I ever worked for to date. One side note of caution - if you work with the IT department in any capacity, there's one woman in the group who definitely has issues, and is generally not liked at all by a lot people. If you come in contact with her, you'll know.

This is the most unprofessional place/company I’ve ever worked for. Most supervisors at the Survey Operations Center lack communication and employee management skills. This department treats its employees disrespectfully and shows no appreciation for people that bend backwards to get the work they need done. I picked this job because it was supposedly “flexible” with respect to the schedule. I constantly had managers calling and blowing up my phone on my days off asking me to come in because employees keep calling out. Have you ever wondered why your employees might not want to work with you? The only time managers would speak to you was to call you out on your mistakes. There was never any solid training structure in place for interviewers/research assistants. Just a training session where you watch someone present PowerPoint slides for 4 hours almost non-stop. Overall a very cheap company with a lot of unprofessional staff. Be mindful of your labor procedures.

I worked at Mathematica for about 5 months and I loved working there. Unfortunately I was laid-off because supposedly there was not any projects available left to work on. So they laid off 4 of my other colleagues and me, yet after they laid us off they hired a new staff. They did not even give me an early notice and this negatively affected me. They promised me that when there was a project available they would give me a call back. 3 months later I reapplied and Mathematica offered me a position. I was excited to start training, however unexpectedly I received a call from headquarters saying that they were sorry that the position was no longer available because they had already hired their employees for the Tucson location. I was very upset and if you want to work here just know that this is a temporary position and they will dispose you once they no longer need you. I had high expectations for this company but they let me down.

I worked two different projects for Mathematica Policy &  Research. Mathematica collects data for policy making decisions for the government.  As a remote employee in Calif. many States away from the Company main office in Princeton,  NJ. I was supervised in the field with the use of computer and telephone CAPRI management. I had fabulous supervisors who were accessible & mentoring even. Each day I was out in the field with my list of people to literally research, locate by different means, find & interview.  I enjoyed the work very much. I loved to investigate, research  & complete the interview. It was a challenge. We had a debriefing, instructional, information, phone call at least once a week with our supervisor & remote meetings with the main office in NJ. monthly. I enjoyed the independence & it helped me to refine my time management & productivity.

I liked the fact that I was on the road and worked alone or when I partnered with one of my family members.  However, there were no benefits and job security.  I also didn't like how people (sometimes I was partnered with people other than family) sabotaged me by saying things behind my back and instead of management coming to me, they instead don't return my emails for upcoming projects that were promised to me.  I think the problem was that I had my own system then someone else want to totally change it and it becomes out of order.  When I stand my ground, that's when I feel the atmosphere change.  There were a few people that I know said some things that weren't true because I wouldn't let them run over me. I know for a fact one of the guys talked to a teacher and said some untruths about how I conducted myself during testing because she told me. 
After that, I just didn't enjoy my job like I used to.

Mathematica gives good opportunities to work on a a variety of projects/topic areas and staff are very smart and competent. However, "junior" staff are overworked, and quite frankly underpaid for the level of effort expected to dedicate to each project. There's an expectation to work a full 8 hour day every single day, so if you charge even an hour to overhead it appears that you are not fully staffed - very unsustainable model that easily leads to burnout. 

The company is allegedly working on being more transparent with career advancement, but it's still unclear how to advance within roles. You'll certainly do more work and be given more responsibilities within projects, but your pay and staff level will not reflect that. PTO policy is also pretty awful (8 paid holidays and 19 PTO days accrued over the course of the year for junior staff).

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Researcher 15 salaries reported	$133,033 per year
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