Pros
IQPC is filled with very talented individuals in each of their departments. You will get to make great friends in this open office environment and learn how to sell, market, produce, and operate each of their conferences. You will get to learn a CRM system that is very key this day and age. You are able to learn about very niche industries and topics that you would never have thought would be relevant to make money on. Learning how to make a cold call to prospective clients and handling objections will only further benefit your sales skills in the long run. Delegate sales is where I started and where I left. Paul Rocco is the Director and provides nothing but great training and development for you as this position is something you would take right out of college to spring board you into your career. I would consider Paul one of my mentors when I was employed at IQPC as he always challenged me to be a top of the sales board month on month. When I first started the turnover rate was anywhere from 3-6 months that then increased to around the 1 year mark after my first year - during the reshaping of the departments. You will be able to receive at least 2-3 promotions if you stay committed in delegate sales to either EQ or Sponsorship. You are also able to learn both inbound sales and outbound sales. After these promotions you are pretty much done and then need to leave to continue learning how to sell different products. Chris Ritchie taking over Sponsorship is one of the best decisions IQPC could have made. He is a great person who actually cares about his team and their success. He will take you aside for a meeting if you are struggling and find out what he can do to make you happy or successful. He knows how the business works and knows how to retain employees.
Kontras
IQPC employees are way too under paid to what the market and competitors are paying for their talents. The $30k delegate sales base was cool back in 2009 & 2010 when the market crashed and no one had jobs. I have news for you, making $30k + $15k in commissions is not going to cut it for a entry level person living in NYC. Your job status at IQPC is only based off of the events you work on and what the managers decide to make you work on - so speak up and get on the best event. To retain employees IQPC needs to start opening their wallets (which they have plenty of $$) and paying these talented individuals what they deserve to help the events keep on growing. It does not go un-noticed how management micro-manages. The mood of each day is based off of what Rick Worden or Rob Shannon feels about the daily sales numbers. This then stems down to the Managing Director who has to walk around the office making sure people are in their seats no minute past 8:30 or her sending out emails to ramp it up and get loud. This is the pure definition of micro management. I get it, they want to make money but for god sakes if you just lay off people for a little bit and let them do their own thing the money will keep on coming in. This in result turns into the blame game of why a event is struggling when in realty it was Rick Worden or Rob Shannon who signed off on having the event run! In return a very smart/talented producer would get fired for a event for not putting up good numbers when they can utilize them possibly in a different department. The office environment was cool for the first year I was there then it turned into a frat house. The only way to calm the frat house is by firing someone or making constant seat changes. Like i said before, this is a place where you come in and learn how to hustle and not look back and be very competitive amongst your colleagues. The computers and software is so out dated and the bathroom on the floor is absolutely disgusting to the point where employees go to different floors to use their bathrooms. You will be promised a quarterly party or even a Christmas party that you will never get until 6 months later because they are so cheap.
