merchandiser

director

intern

finance manager

truck driver

The Coca-Cola Company

Was a mid-level manager and the following is my personal experience.  The following account is not exaggerated whatsoever:

CONS:
1.*BIG ONE... and major decision-maker for me to leave* My second year in this position I was ordered to change the year-end performance rating for a manager (minority) who reported directly to me, because the national averages showed that too many minorities were ranking in the lower percentages. (My manager actually told me this!) Being a woman myself, I felt insulted.  I would like to think that my rating was 'earned' Because of my talent and not 'given' because of my gender or race.  This was wrong on so many levels therefore my personal trust and morale was gone. Despite my pushback due to problems I had noted in performance, the rating was changed.  Later, this particular manager exited due to issues I had noted.
2.Lack of leadership or training - you are on your own. From personal experience, the managers were very proficient in managing their own careers, but not so much at coaching teams.
You must build a network of 'go-to' people.  I could rarely go to my manager with issues.  Questions were answered with questions, ending in a suggestion to reach out to someone else.  Unfortunately, this company is hiring based on college credentials (degrees on your resume), but no work experience with practical application or knowledge; managers with no history actually working in the field or business experience.  
3.Overall, the company is very disorganized and has perfected the art of making easy items complicated due to overactive outsourcing.  As all companies do, this company is constantly changing, however, Coca Cola does not plan out very well.  Communication between departments is very broken.  One department will roll out a massive change without consulting another one and the impact often results in lost productivity, lost profit, lost time (if you are on the special project team) and loss of reliability in management/leaders.  
4.Consistent solves for opportunities is to cut resources, i.e. supplies, jobs, etc.  If missing GP plan, "lets cut a few more people in this or that department." Or, "no more sales supplies are allowed to be purchased until the new year".  Result = the trade looks terrible and display quality suffers effecting sales.  All in the effort to make the quarterly statements look good for stockholders.
5.I also witnessed a company survey in which the answers given by employees was used to determine if their jobs were needed.  The survey was rolled out to the employees as though management was using their feedback to make their jobs easier, but rather, they used the information to determine where they could cut headcount.
6.Due to cut backs and hiring freezes, work-life balance is non-existent.  Kiss your spouse and kids goodbye!

PROS:
I learned to self-develop given that there was no support system.  I built independence and my creativity and innovation blossomed.  (who knows what I could have done with a solid support system from management in my organizational structure) Peers become very close to one another, since we have to figure things out on our own.  There are really good people with a lot of industry experience to learn from.  I learned much from those type of contacts.
I learned to prioritize given the fast-paced environment.  You also become a master at multi-tasking!  

Overall, giving it two stars because I did love many of the people and there were a lot of very smart professionals who I learned from. I can also state that, In conversations I had with peers, many other managers have the same concerns as I did.

 My experience at Coca-Cola did not align with my career goals and salary expectations. It's important to feel that your work balance and compensation align with your values and worth. Unfortunately, Coca-Cola did not meet the mark in providing a stable and fair work environment. I found myself juggling the tasks of three different employees but was only receiving the compensation of one person. Despite the frustration, I tried to maintain a positive attitude and keep pushing forward. A typical work day is a high-stress level, "Putting out Fires," and "extremely excessive" workload, as well as the company's tendency to overload its staff rather than hire more people. Coca-Cola is misleading contractors to believe they will be hired full-time if they work hard. Companies need to be transparent about their hiring practices and not give false hopes to their contractors.
      Training is a two-week overview summary that is not adequate. It is frustrating when the responsibilities differ significantly from what was subliminally presented during the hiring process. They should clarify what's expected of you and make changes to align with original expectations. I experienced distractions despite communicating with my supervisor. It was frustrating when expectations didn't match the reality of the situation. It was extremely challenging to focus on a task when you're constantly receiving emails, calls, urgent fires, and unnecessary meetings. I communicated with my supervisor my concerns and was scheduled to meet with others in the department to organize my day better. That did not help. All it did was waste my time and add more to my already busy list of things that needed to be completed.   I was told the previous account coordinator could do the work without a problem. When I took over the accounts, they were already in disarray.
      Coca-Cola needs to improve in hiring more people to provide an adequate work-life balance for employees to succeed. They have many resources and support tools available. However, due to the excessive workload, you do not have time to utilize those resources throughout the day. You're so stressed during the day that you want to avoid learning anything after work hours. It creates a level of anxiety, dreading work.
      The most enjoyable part of the job was meeting a few people who helped me. I appreciate having supportive colleagues willing to lend a hand and provide me with advice, therapy, and guidance when needed. It made the work environment more enjoyable and helped me stay somewhat motivated.
Companies need to recognize the negative impact of excessive workloads on their employees, including increased anxiety and burnout. A supportive and fair work environment is crucial for employee success and satisfaction. Coca-Cola should address these issues, improve the overall work experience, and hire more employees.

While I'm thankful for my time with CCR and the goals it has allowed me to accomplish, I am disconcerted with how they manage their employees and develop talent.  

I will say this, they hire a number of perfectly capable employees and, in the right combinations, these groups can develop interpersonal bonds that enhance productivity and efficiency in the work place.  The problem is that this is entirely coincidental and random.  

I've thankfully had the good fortune to develop great working relationships with my coworkers and do my best to cultivate an energized atmosphere of respect and productivity but this is through my own initiative and not anything I have been trained upon or asked to do.  I've done this because, the way the shifts are divided, I'm the most senior department employee on my shift and I want to help my coworkers grow and develop their skills.  I wish they broached team-building, job skill training, and career skill growth more directly and actually guided employees towards their professional goals as this is simply my efforts to make our work environment more dynamic and welcoming.

The position has taught me to operate independently and helped me to develop leadership skills to offer guidance and direction to my coworkers.  Due to this independence, I often am able to employ problem-solving skills to troubleshoot a number of problems to find creative solutions which is, incidentally, my favorite aspect of the job.

The downside though, is that the job can be tedious at times and is very hard on new employees as the company often dictates mandatory overtime (whether you wanted to come in or not), and barring a glut of volunteers, will employ a seniority-based draft for any necessary staffing with least senior personnel being first in line to lose their time to rest and recover.  This can occur multiple weeks in a row and there is no rotation - the least senior personnel will always be forced to come in unless a more senior employee volunteers in their stead.  As expected, this leads to a dichotomous split in the employee pool: employees who have 10, 15, 20+ years of experience (in the exact same position they were hired to fill - no advancement); and the rest who generally have a year or less of experience before getting burned out by overwork and moving on to greener pastures.  Because vertical employee movement is so minimal, it is not uncommon for employees to be at entry level for 5-10 years before having an opportunity to apply for a lead position - never mind a supervisory or management position.  The modern professional can ill afford to stagnate for so long without a more focused and dedicated career and skill development program.

It's not a tech company, so don't expect to be at the cutting edge of technology. I say that, but I'm talking about one specific function of the company. There are other functions such as IT which seem to be doing more interesting stuff for software developers or computer scientists. I feel like my team should have just been purely doing data analysis/science work, but for some reason there was a separate sub-team which managed one of the totally unrelated software systems that Coca-Cola uses.

For the most part, the people on the team were absolutely amazing to work with. Such a diverse mix of cultures and personalities. And just some really great, genuine and generally nice people that I have made lifelong friendships with. There are of course some in the company that are hanging in there to reach pension age, and that kind of slows progress down a little bit because of a lack of interest and willingness to incorporate modern technologies. These people just tend to stick with what they know and kind of force others along in using those outdated technologies. There was also one or two people who were clearly milking their way to a salary and by that I mean they were pretending to be the brainiac that, if removed, would cause the team's collapse, but in reality, they did not much at all and caused all sorts of other other conflicts due to their personality issues. This brought the team morale down immensely, but that problem was finally sorted by management and everything is much better. It did take some time though for this to be resolved.
I did notice that a lot of the interesting tech projects in the company seem to be outsourced to consultancy firms.

Other than when being part of a project managed by the old-fashioned colleagues mentioned above, you do have a lot of autonomy to use whichever technology you feel will work best to get the task done, obviously so-long as it is supported within the Coke system. That did mean you could use whichever programming language you wanted really, and if you could use Python/R to handle the data analysis/visualization tasks then even better.

Such a great office environment in Atlanta. Free Coca-Cola drinks of all types around. Free access to World of Coke. Great cafeteria, but I heard it was better in days gone by. 
I'm very lucky and have the opportunity to work with some of the highest levels of leaders at the company and for an intern that is a really great experience.

My managers were great. Have no complaints about them. As a young person they were firm but very fair, and that's what a person like me needs as it's lessons like these which will treat me well later on in life in my future career.

Grateful to Coca-Cola for the experience.

worked for Coke for 2 years at three different facilities and every warehousewas the same long long work hours you do not get off until the work is finished coke does not care if that's 8 am the next morning they dont care if that's 18 hours you have to work 19 hours that you have to work you do not get to leave until the work is finished no time and half overtime since you get payed by case you can not slow down you cannot leave until the Work is done .. I've seen people get written up and terminated due to them having to go home to make sure their family is OK family emergencies and They still got written up because Coke said thats not a valid reason for leaving the work day... doctors notes are not an excuse you will get written up and terminated if you are sick but you do not have any sick time to compensate so if you're in the hospital for a day that does not matter to them they will fire you for not coming to work unless you're sick 3 days in a rowbut then even that you have to call HR and basically beg for them too except your doctor's note..  coke needs to do a better job at showing appreciation to their employees never getting preciation shown while I was there older employees told me that Coke
 used to be appreciative company but then they quit doing it due to budget cost . give me a break They just didn't want to do it anymore. bottom line save yourself a lot of wear and tear on your body And a lot of frustration and a lot of questions of why Coca Cola the biggest non alcoholic beverage company in the world does not want to treat their employees well and so cheap when it comes to their own employees if you have any type of family or any type of life you might as well forget about that if you're working for this company in the warehouse or as a driver  If u do anything besides corporate Then this is not a family company basically just forget about your life and your family if you work here do not let the name Coca Cola pull you into wanting to work for this company it is really really not a good company and coke did nothing wrong to me personally for me to write this its just  What I observedover 2 years at three different facilities. Most warehouse ppl or drivers  that you Meet from coke would say the same thing if they work in The warehouse how they were treated especially drivers..COCA COLA CARES ABOUT THEIR CUSTOMERS NOT EMPLOYEES

Regardless of what they say, or "how much better it's getting" you will work 60+ hour avg. week. after return filing can be as little as 45 hour week (minimum expectation). Manager is preoccupied with her own tasks, so planning is minimal. Sr. Manager pretty much the same. They try to make up for professional "absence/aloofness" with potlucks, cakes, cookies, candy, etc., but reality is more like slave labor camp. Work is somewhat interesting (many pieces to the return filing process), but seems overkill when considering the "big picture."  managers step over dollars to pick up pennies and are in denial about why people leave the tax team ("they're new, they want to be accountants, don't like tax, don't want to do the work," etc.). Real problem is the process to prepare the tax returns is irreparably broken and managers don't have time to consider sweeping new options (they will consider minimal process improvements, but are very adverse to change). Salaried positions: must wait 18 months to post out for another position (if available). The manager will be mad at you for abandoning the "team" when you do.  Only consider this dept if you are desperate for a job, can handle no work life balance, long hours, and manager's expectation that you will work as they do (from home, weekends, evenings, early mornings) to get every manual task done on time, regardless of the circumstances.  Other tax accountants are nice, but will always be a revolving door and managers will blame those who left for all problems.  there is no official comp time policy (all at manager's discretion & its never a good time to take time off). You won't learn many transferrable skills (no time, or "people don't want to learn"); manager(s) must approve everything (cc'd on all emails, etc.), and tasks are micro managed to death. No trust, and manager and staff argue a lot. Reaching out to HR will only make managers mad.  No one above managers worries about overworked staff or poor morale. Seems Not all depts. are like this one, but this is what you'll get working in sales tax in Brandon.  sorry. calling it like I live it.  very sad that this situation is allowed to continue.  one guy works 7 - 3:30 but is usually behind in his work and others pitch in to help to meet monthly deadlines. Not sure if he works from home too.

Each day I have a set route that will differ from day to day but will be the same stops each week. I would check on my hand held computer to see current and upcoming ads for each stop. I plan out a course to follow based on location and efficiency. At each stop (or outlet) I will check to see if we as a company have certain priorities that we try to meet for each quarter. I will walk the outlet to: identify key opportunities for Coca-Cola and our customers to gain business, ensure all of our product is to our "Look of Success," and to order missing product. Then I will inventory our back stock and us that long  with the ad information to determine an accurate order for the outlet.

Coca-cola is a team composed of many people and many positions. I have learned that we could not be as successful as we are without everyone evolved. It takes all employees' involvement to make things run smoothly. My management is very involved and always tries to put us all in the best possible position for us to succeed. If they need to dive in and merchandise product, sell in product, or what ever else they are more than willing to do so. My co-workers are also team players. Many of us call each other for advice or suggestions on different obstacles. Many times we help out each other by cover some stops for each other should one be falling behind. All of us from management to entry level jobs generally respect and care for one another and want to see every one do well 

I have also learned that its not always easy to try to predict what a store will sell through or not on any giving day. I have to find a way to use the tools that are given to me and my best judgment to write an order. Another challenge is balance my day out so that I am not spending too much time at one store or doing one particular task.

My favorite part about my job is that fact that I am working for one of the largest companies in the world that brings joy and happiness to people of ages and races. when I mention that I work for Coca-cola everyone instantly knows what that is and starts up a conversation even if they prefer the another brand over ours. I get a sense of pride when I see someone drinking a Coke or wearing a Coke shirt.

I am not going to list pros and cons, but rather I will tell you under what circumstances YOU SHOULD accept this job and under what circumstances YOU SHOULD NOT accept this job. 

You SHOULD ACCEPT this job IF: You are comfortable working 12-14 hour days, enjoy demanding physical labor, etc. This job provides steady income and good benefits (3 weeks paid vacation/401k/affordable health insurance) In addition, if you are not comfortable with someone looking over your shoulder and micromanaging you then this job could be a good fit for you. I honestly feel that if you are out of shape this job could positively alter your life (with good nutrition)...you are constantly moving and there is never a shortage of work. There is a certain satisfaction that comes from being the last man between the company's product and the end user, you are at the bottom of the totem pole, but simultaneously one of the most important pieces of this company.

*Disclaimer: I recently left my job as a merchandiser

You SHOULD NOT ACCEPT IF: Advancement is one of your key motivators...merchandisers are capable of advancement in this company, but from the numerous account managers i spoke to it became clear to me that advancement often took many years. Another thing you should know is that the primary people you will be dealing with are the employees/managers of various retail stores (mainly walmart) and many of these people can be unpleasant at times. Also, there are many elements that are out of your control when it comes to doing this job in an effective manner: the person who merchandises before you may leave the backroom a mess, pallet jacks are unavailable at times, and the way an order is built can dramatically increasing your working time. I would say you should not accept this job if you have high aspirations in life, in this company there will always be someone higher than you (everyone has a boss), and although you are not being micromanaged I feel that you could be working hard 12-14 hour days on something more lofty. This opportunity cost is the main reason I have decided to leave. Best of luck to you, whatever decision you make.

From the outside this company seems like a great opportunity, they make it seem as though its an hourly job, but its not, at least its not hourly Albany,NY. This job is a commission based job, not  so bad, but its not full commisson, so which means you get paid for each case around $.35 and for bibs it is around $.50 pre bib. The things is commission is only given for your smaller stops, but when it come to bulk stops like Hannafrods, Price Choppers, and Shop rites, you receive a drop rate of $17, this means that in steaed of you getting full commission they rip you off. lets say you you have a bulk stop of 400 cases, each case in commission is $.35, instead of you getting the $140 owed to you, you get the drop rate for the low price of, you guessed it $17. The best part is the pack outs, basicly your'er not just unloading the truck and delivering the product, you also have to put each product on the shelf. In most pack outs your putting away 50 to 250 cases of soda by your self no help, your filling the coolers also. With time and hours spent on packing out a 50 case pack out only gives you in commission $17.50. A pack can take 45 min to an hour and a half, and you still have 19 stops of pack outs to go. Unless you are super man nine times out of ten you'er working 12-14 hrs a day, with commission breaks down to around $14 an hour to driv a tractor trailer. Now when you first walk through the doors they will tell you you get $20 an hour and make it seem like it hourly plus commision. If you like long day hard work for low pay and just enough time to see your family for 5 min out the befor going to sleep just to come back and do this job all over again, then this is the job for you!!!!! 

P.S. The managment is horrible disorganized, routes are poorly built and you be in seven diffrent areas in one day, you dont bid routes you bid areas never a routine , always fluctuating days your foreced in a lot on your days off. the company is not all bad across the country just certain areas, plus depanding on where you are its hourlylike in NYC, Boston for example plus you get helpers, but in Albany, NY if the products go in the basement and you have 75 cases, your on your own, very littel help. The last thing is we get injured a lot and they dont care just work in pain they say.

Where do I begin?? The Account managers are the salesman of the company and are the face of the company. Meanwhile the drivers and merchandisers are union employees and are trained to not listen to the account managers and constantly use their "union card" so they can do less work. For instance if u place an order the driver would take his sweet time delivering it and then u have to hope that the merchandiser shows up to pack it out. And if they don't,  it's your fault and guess what? Cause of the union you cannot touch the product. So nobody wins and the customer suffers. The DSM uses his team to make himself look good and never provides you with bonus updates so you can actually make some money. A daily conference call that wastes about 20-30 min of your morning which is sent to you in an email anyway. Then a weekly Tuesday meeting repeating everything for a 3rd or 4th time. Horrible training on handheld computers which they just expect you to know and if you don't learn on your own management won't help, they will just dump it on a fellow employee. If a fellow employee is on vacation you're told to run his route as well. The DSM is responsible for that but he will put it on you. The DSM spends the whole day in the branch checking his email and calling you 5-10 times a day about issues that you cannot resolve without his help. Also if a merchandiser does not do his job you're asked to become a private investigator and take pictures of the merchandisers and drivers poor work. Which created friction with fellow employee since  you're trying to get each other in trouble instead of working as a team and trying to fix the problem together they pit you against our fellow employees. I can go on but that's the main issues. No company car anymore. Lousy car reimbursement that will barely cover your gas and insurance. Threaten your job if numbers aren't made instead of working with you and try to help you.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Merchandiser 2 salaries reported	$43,794 per year
Director 7 salaries reported	$176,540 per year
Intern 4 salaries reported	$3,628 per month
Finance manager 3 salaries reported	$128,000 per year
Truck driver 27 salaries reported	$25.68 per hour

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