If I could give zero stars I would. Wasted the better part of a decade in this pit only to:
- have good work be rewarded with more work, while peers received raises, awards, and promotions due to their personal friendships with management
- endure a toxic work environment fueled by sadistic bosses who would make it their mission to keep you down and gaslight you at every opportunity
- acquire zero relevant skills or abilities that keep pace with the modern career landscape (seriously, there were colleagues that still insisted on working with paper and pencils and thought I was a comp sci genius for knowing how to do an add function in excel)
- be denied opportunities to present and travel to conferences, because only managers are allowed to galavant around the globe on the company's dime
- make crap money with pitiful cost of living increases for a job that requires a master's degree (at minimum)
- be forced to work with unprofessional colleagues who were protected by leadership (if you raise concerns about mistreatment, you're branded as difficult)
After years of trying to make it work, I reached a breaking point and did everything possible to upskill and pivot into a real corporation. With years of hindsight behind me, I can honestly encourage any prospective candidate to run for the hills: the stress and monotony of this pointless job is a true waste of your time and talent. The "ETS name" and the "internal celebrities" who have been there for decades are virtually unknown and irrelevant to anyone outside of the testing world; it's pathetic to think I once cared about what any of them thought. An academic background can land you in many wonderful places with a contemporary outlook, a true business strategy, and compensation you deserve; you do not have to settle for this wasteland, especially now that most universities are going test optional and the broader public realizes that standardized tests are outdated, a poor predictor of anyone's intellectual prowess, and certainly do not "unlock opportunities" or "level playing fields" for anyone despite what ETS's Z-list marketing team tries to spin up (in fact, it's quite the opposite).
