Amazing Colleagues and Culture, Great Career Advancement Opportunities, Competitive Benefits - Database Analyst Mastercard Employee Review

5.0
Sep 1, 2015
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

1. The company is filled with young, driven individuals that are mostly fresh out of college. This makes for a work-hard play-hard atmosphere in which people are constantly pushing each other to develop both personally and professionally. 2. You will be working with a lot of familiar Fortune 500 companies and aiding them in making very important decisions. 3. The benefits are comparable to top-tier technology companies for hires straight out of college. 4. While most of projects will be based on client demand, there are also many opportunities to work on side projects that excite you along with other internal affairs such as recruiting. 5. APT has rigorous bi-annual review process to aid career development. 6. You will have the opportunity to learn from and work with experienced professionals, as most projects have a VP staffed on them. 7. The hours are very flexible - I generally come in the office between 7am and 10am. 8. APT offers the opportunity to travel to other office locations (SF, London, Taipei) in order to interact with colleagues from those offices. This provides cost-saving synergies when you have vacation plans already aligned in that region. 9. You will be given complete ownership of your work after a few months.

Cons

1. The hours can be demanding at times when multiple projects are in full swing. 2. After 1-2 weeks of training, you will be thrown in the deep-end of client-facing projects. While you will have several team members guiding you along the way, it can be quite daunting at first. However, I think APT attracts the type of people that enjoy such challenges so this wasn't too much of a concern. 3. The company is growing very rapidly, so it is losing some of its appeal of feeling like a start-up.

Explore other reviews about Mastercard

5.0
Jun 23, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

People are highly intelligent and things seem to operate efficiently

Cons

Large ship so changes are hard to make

4.0
May 27, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Mastercard does a great job fostering an inclusive and supportive environment. There are genuinely good people throughout the organization, and leadership often invests in employee engagement through events, recognition, and culture-building initiatives. I enjoyed many of the relationships I built while working there, and there are teams that truly care about collaboration and supporting one another.

Cons

Compensation at the director level did not feel competitive compared to the level of responsibility expected. Career advancement can also be extremely challenging due to how top-heavy the organization is with senior leadership roles. There are a large number of Senior Vice Presidents, sometimes without clear scope or experience aligned to the title, which creates limited room for high-performing employees to grow. At times, it felt like senior leaders were being hired primarily to manage or communicate with other senior leaders, rather than drive meaningful operational impact. In product and go-to-market roles especially, priorities are often heavily driven by funding decisions. It can be frustrating when projects suddenly shift in importance or remain underfunded for long periods of time while awaiting senior leadership review. This sometimes leaves highly talented employees in limbo, unable to move initiatives forward despite strong momentum or market opportunity. The organization can also be very comfortable with the status quo, which creates a slower pace that many employees seem accustomed to. For people who are highly motivated and eager to drive change, it can feel difficult to navigate the number of roadblocks and layers of approval required to move initiatives forward.

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