Pros
If you are on the consulting side of the business, that is probably the only area that is allowed to grow within the United States. They do offer 401k matching and a pension. Vacation benefits are slightly above average, but there are many restrictions on when you can use them and many years you will not be able to take all your vacation time. Lower level managers do what they can and every one I worked for was extremely personable and supportive. I believe they are using the hand they are dealt to the best of their abilities, but there is very little room for flexibility and innovation. The business itself is extremely stable, as IMS Health essentially has a monopoly in the sector that they operate in. Their data is critical to the pharmaceutical companies and people that buy their data.
Kontras
I was an employee of IMS for over 5 years and I have seen drastic changes across the board these past few years. The number one focus of upper management is to cut costs and that is it - extreme tunnel vision. There really is no company culture, it always comes back to how much money can we save. Casual Friday's used to be the norm, and eventually this became allowed on every day of the week. Suddenly this was all taken away and there were NO days that casual dress was allowed. This is a pretty silly example, but it shows just exactly what upper management's attitude is towards the every day employees. Decisions like this as we go backwards just leave you scratching your head and wondering what the point of the decision even was. Are we being punished like little kids? Or apparently wearing jeans may offend some of them? There is very little concern over the small benefits as they slowly get eroded. Extremely little focus on employee morale and this company is the definition of one that only reports to their shareholders (previously private equity firms). Their is even a defined "us vs them" mentality between teams because of this cost cutting culture. Nobody wants to be the next one to lose their job so people are quick to point out the errors of others instead of working towards a solution. I have seen quite a few bright young people come into the company, only to watch them leave one or two years later. I know this is more the norm these days, but IMS seems to be bleeding talent. And the talent that does not leave on their own choice, many lay offs occur and the job is outsourced to a different country. And that is not to say that the new person isn't smart, but people who have built relationships and knowledge for 5,10,15,20 years are being let go. A lot of knowledge is lost in that process and the same relationships are simply not built when a person is on a completely different continent. Their are a lot of antiquated processes where one person has been doing the same thing for 10 years, but very little documentation on the process. That is because that single point of knowledge has no time to create the documentation! When that person is let go? All the little nuances that people took for granted start to cause errors that you never even knew existed. As more and more things are outsourced, the data quality has dropped and 2 people are expected to do the work of 3 people. And then those 2 people are supposed to correct the new mistakes that are being made and train the person taking over their job. If you are getting into any area on the back end, I don't think IMS Health is a good location. Whether it is IT, data, analysis, technical support these are all constantly being cut and moved elsewhere.