support technician

technical specialist

support analyst

software engineer

technical coordinator

ISM Canada

As an unionized employee at ISM Canada, I work 9 of the 10 work days in a two week period.  I work 8 hours and 20 min each day (7.5 hours average per day) and get an EDO 1 day every two weeks.  ISM Canada, as an IBM company, encourages you to further your education and certifications (of which you are mandated to take a min 41 hour per year).  This greatly reduces the chance of your skills degrading over time, and aids in your career progression.  The management at ISM is similar to most other IT companies with great to bad managers.  The better the manager, the more likely they will be in areas of the company that are making money, and are the most productive.  The worst managers tend to be in areas of the business that are contractually necessary, and are seen as an expense to the company.  ISM Canada has hired several employees from around the world in the last 5 years.  This has made the company a cultural mosaic, and a joy for people that enjoy experiencing other cultures.  The hardest part of my job at ISM has been working in contractually necessary areas of the company.  These projects are always underfunded, and expectations exceed what is possible.  The most enjoyable part of my job has been when I can directly contribute to a client's success.  ISM Canada has a process to gain client satisfaction, and manage their expectations.  This is used in our yearly reviews.  Getting an excellent client satisfaction review from a contractually necessary project is a highly rewarding experience, and makes all the hard work worth it in the end.

Typical days included researching a variety of technology options, solving business technology issues, developing new approaches for delivery of services, and managing implementation of products or technologies as needed.

As my role became more advisory over time billable hours declined. When times get tough, it is the billable person who represents value to an accounting team even though the amount of billable activity may be directly attributable to the decisions or ideas introduced by someone behind the scenes who does not bill the customer. Sadly vision and imagination are not easily quantifiable in dollar terms. 

This business struggles in the sense that the management is trying to go in a new direction but customers and staff still expect and want much of the same as before. Leadership struggles to market a cohesive updated vision internally and to its customers.

Co workers are amazing, talented, and most, good to work with. All persons were accomplished and professional making work very enjoyable.

The hardest part of the job was pinning down exactly what was being asked for by management, and prioritising in order to provide some perceived and quantifiable value to the business.

Interaction with people, both internal and customers alike made the job enjoyable. Every once in a while, one of your ideas or approaches leads to a business win which is also very satisfying.

Unless you are desperate please do not leave your employer to take a job here.  Yes, the pay is outstanding… but you will earn every dollar.  

If you are unemployed then go for it.  But keep looking for alternate employment.  During my engagement it wasn’t odd to have people only last a month or two. 

It is unionized and I naively believed that it would translate into one with great work life balance.  Untrue.  You will never work a 40 hour work week.   50 to 60 hours is the norm and often you will put in  more.  

Turnover is absolutely the worst I’ve seen.  Company culture is awful.  

Which I should have guessed because in the first few weeks when HR sent out a demand to the managers that all reports were to post online a positive review because their rankings were so low.  You’ll see mine there too. It was in no way an “ask”.  


ISM Canada, an IBM Company, is a great employer to work with. It generally has a friendly family atmosphere. With lots of flexibility for work at home.
I provided HR generalist support to approx 250 staff, including working with managers' on recruitment, attendance management and performance issues. 
As well, I managed all disability (occupational and non-occ) for the entire BC region, approximately 500 staff.
There was a degree of office politics that made it hard to navigate the organization, this was a top down issue.
I am a personal and professional development coach as well, any time I was able to utilize that skill were my most enjoyable aspect of the role.

I am a passionate HR professional, my philosophy being, treat your staff with respect, allow as much autonomy as possible, with out them there would be no company.

A typical day at work could be responding to outages (internal or external), developing process or identifying gaps in process and then recommending changes to process to close the gap, or performing root cause analysis. 
I learned a great deal about interaction with vendors and all levels of the organization and worked with a wide variety of co workers internally, high level customers and our parent company.  
The hardest part of the job was putting forth tremendous effort on a daily basis long term only to be bumped out of roles by people who had more seniority but not necessarily aptitude or experience. 
The most enjoyable part of the job was the variety of tasks on a daily basis.

ISM was a great place to work for the most part. 

I started at the service desk, went to deskside and software packaging. Unfortunately my problems with the company stem from coworkers who do not carry their own weight. 

My promotion was delayed several times due to my old departments staff being less than awesome. I was a little disheartened that instead of actions taken to improve their knowledge. I was brought back into my old role to support them. 

Their process to backfill employees is on occasion, terrible. I was often the only person in a department while there should have been more. Resulting in my physical health declining or failing the client. 

My direct managers were great, even if they knew the situation was not ideal. 

In a typical work day you sit in a cubicle next to some great coworkers and answer computer support calls over the phone. The social atmosphere is great, the clients are great and overall the day to day experience is very enjoyable. If I had to choose my favorite part it would be the level of support you get from coworkers and managers. It isn't a hostile environment where you feel pressured to be concerned about performance or asking questions but a very hospitable place to learn!

I would recommend ISM as an employer.

ISM-Canada is a professional body of Supply Chain practitioners, academics and industry leaders transforming supply management into an integral element of a successful business, regardless of industry or field. Public or private organisations take advantage of tools like the the ISM Monthly Report on Business measuring productivity in manufacturing and non manufacturing sectors. Tracking trends gives those who analyse this data a heads up on what is coming at them, Headwinds or tailwinds; This data can make a difference to your bottom line.

I worked for this company for about 15 years.  It was a decent place to work in the beginning, but the union is very weak and the company is very seedy.  Wages continue to decrease, jobs are filled by "New Canadians" that are out of scope, and essentially people being taken advantage.

Just avoid this company at all costs.  They don't care about you, they don't  care about work life balance, they will pay you less as often as they can. 

I Worked with many wonderful people here.   I loved my job at first, however it greatly changed due to upper management decisions to cut back $$.   In the end the environment became unbalanced, stressful and an unhappy place to work. 

 A crucial job in the company was deleted and all its roles and responsibilities were put onto my department as well as duties previously done by supervisors without any wage increases.

Top Job Titles	Average salary
Support technician 6 salaries reported	$5,320 per month
Technical specialist 3 salaries reported	$6,692 per month
Support analyst 1 salary reported	$6,076 per month
Software engineer 2 salaries reported	$6,759 per month
Technical coordinator 1 salary reported	$6,759 per month

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