ADP Totalsource an extremely difficult sale and working environment - District Manager ADP Employee Review

2.0
Jan 3, 2013
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Big company with fortune 500 benefits. Numerous divisions to work for to enhance career growth. Great company to work for right out of college. Training is excellent and ADP looks great on your resume. Good suite of product offerings. In THEORY having multiple partners (Payroll, Majors, Resource and TotalSource) helps the sales process and its easy to shift to one product or the other depending on client needs.

Cons

Cons are centered specifically on ADP TotalSource- *Having multiple partners that have zero accountability is a challenge. *Anytime something is sold especially very large deals, people seem to come out of the woodwork demanding a split. *Not only outside competition but internal competition between BUs. ADP employees will steer people away from TotalSource to benefit themselves. SBS Payroll, will try to make the client take payroll first and then "double dip" and bring in TotalSource when that might not be what is best for the client. *Policies are enforced at managements will. In other words if youre a favorite, policies are simple to get around and manipulate. If youre not a favorite policies are the law. *Somewhere along the way management forgot to manage people and only manages to numbers. *Management is completely unprofessional. Everyday there is something that could be an HR issue. Very much do as I say not as I do and certainly not a lead by example environment. *Very difficult sale- Only owners can make the true decision and small business owners are a difficult group of people to work with overall. Many people in a small businesses feel as if TotalSource is coming to take their job. True or not its a tough objection to overcome. *The companies that need TotalSource the most are too risky and ADP will not write them. ADP Totalsource turns down 50% of the companies that say yes. *Politics, Politics, Politics- play the game or get left behind in the dust *Overly obsessed with meetings- there are meetings about meetings about meetings *Everything seems to be the flavor of the week. Massive fire drills to get things done at the last minute for projects that are a huge focus today, but a week from now will be completely forgotten. * Antiquated sales techniques- An example would be Bottom Line drops. You are expected quarterly to drop magazines off to business owners unsolicited. *Management is completely out of touch and tries to rule from intimidation and public humiliation *Forced dials on "in-house" days lead to multiple people calling the same person multiple times a day. *Siloed divisions and access to only your territory in SalesForce make partnering inefficient and ineffective. *Management is trained to ignore you if you have an issue and revert to policy *Commissions are uncapped, however its very difficult to make a lot of money after your first year. Commissions are structured to highly incentivize those that are over quota. Its difficult to reach quota and whether you do or do not your quota takes massive increases every year, making it harder and harder to make money. *Average tenure is pretty short very few people in the Chicago market have been there longer then three years. Overall I found this to be one of the more difficult sales jobs Ive had in my career. The amount of time and effort put into a sales process that 85% of the time leads to a no, coupled with the amount of money that can be made and the amount of stress all levels of management put you through it doesnt really even out.

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Jun 17, 2026
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Pros

work life balance continued education opportunity

Cons

segmented internal departments some unreasonable client escalations

2.0
Jun 15, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

- Established company with a long history and relatively stable business operations. - Provides a sense of job stability compared to many organizations navigating rapid changes in the current AI-driven market. - Lower risk of frequent restructuring or large-scale layoffs than many high-growth technology companies. - Opportunity to work with experienced employees who have deep institutional and domain knowledge. - Predictable work environment that may appeal to individuals seeking long-term stability over rapid change. - Strong choice for professionals who value job security and a steady career path in an uncertain economic climate.

Cons

- Documentation is limited or rusted, and many operational processes lack clear runbooks or standardized procedures, making onboarding and troubleshooting more difficult than necessary. - If you're coming from a modern, fast-paced engineering environment, the organization may feel behind current industry practices and tooling. - Internal politics can sometimes outweigh technical merit or execution. - There are teams with very long-tenured employees where change and innovation can be difficult to drive. - Decision-making often involves multiple layers of approval, resulting in significant bureaucracy and slower execution. - Processes can move slowly, and collaboration is not always transparent across teams, leading to inefficiencies and occasional confusion around ownership. - In some areas, roles, responsibilities, and operational processes are not clearly defined, creating unnecessary chaos and inconsistent ways of working. - Engineering standards and best practices vary considerably between teams, making cross-team collaboration challenging. - Organizational change tends to happen slowly, which can be frustrating for employees who are focused on modernization, automation, and continuous improvement.

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