Lafarge North America Reviews

Former Employee – worked at Lafarge North America full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – their knowledge in the field

Cons – try every thing cheap and half done, with issues later on

Advice to Senior Management – Look at long term plans and life time cost of projects

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company

Current Employee – been working at Lafarge North America full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – -Great Benifits
-Yearly Bonus structure
-Pension
- Great location
-Great people

Cons – -Not many opportunities to move up
-Weak management
-micro management

Advice to Senior Management – none

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company

Former Employee – worked at Lafarge North America

Pros – Lafarge offer one of best overall compensation package for employees; it has some intelligent people to work with most of time.

Cons – In corporate offices, there are ver limited career advance opportunity in certain position for minorities. It has a high pressure work environment.

Advice to Senior Management – The management will need to think of ways to retain some of the best people there in corporate office so they don't lose talent.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Lafarge North America

Pros – Generous Benefits
Flexibility in your workweek

Cons – Work in many rural areas

Advice to Senior Management – More diversity

Current Employee – been working at Lafarge North America

Pros – Safety is a highlight, Lafarge cares for people, and there is support when you need it (both personal and technical).

Cons – Don't try to take any more than a ten-day vacation (unless you're French!). The upper echelons are tight-knit and not necesarily there because of competence. Paralysis by analysis can be very frustrating, entrepreneurialism is apparently a target, but there is no real evidence of acceptance yet. Analyze everything to the seventh decimal place, and then go and do 100 alternate scenarios, however unlikely. Many good opportunities have been lost, but no-one cares.

Advice to Senior Management – Take some risks! Hunkering down in this environment is not the way to be a global industry leader once we recover.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Lafarge North America

Pros – They do try to support best practices, a lot of surveys,at the same time a lot of red tape.

Cons – They seem to have not listened to the small customer and put to many eggs in the big customers basket. There is a place there for another small supplier to get started. You could charge more money for prompt service, it costs small companies a lot of money to pay 4 or 5 guys to wait around to get service.

Former Employee – worked at Lafarge North America

Pros – Salary and benefits were very good, global opportunities for advancement. some very bright people.

Cons – political environment, poor work balance, many distractions from corp, lack of operations or hr experience in senior managers. not always interested in actual solving a problem before moving on to the next issue...things tend to fester, lack of trust and mentors in North America

Advice to Senior Management – Stay the course on a few priorities until they are completed and functional to the desired outcome...Always have a new one ready to go but do not start it until somthing else has been properly completed or put to bed. The operations have been squeezed too much and consolidation of the regions is now necessary. Everything needs to be slimmer, trimmer and simpler - eliminate the bureacracy which prevents decision making and drives away some of your bright stars. Creativity does not appear to be cultivated in North America

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Lafarge North America

Pros – Benefits are great. Better than industry.

Cons – No accountability of management. No employee recognition.

Advice to Senior Management – Hold people accountable

Former Employee – worked at Lafarge North America

Pros – Things are constantly changing and being reorganized and so this gives you a chance to learn new things.

Cons – Going through reorganizations every 2 years or so is very tiring. While you do learn new things when your job or department is redesigned, you also lose a lot of time by having to "start over" constantly. Employees fear job loss due to the next reorganization and so moral is lower.

Advice to Senior Management – While change is good and a company can benefit from it greatly, the frequency of reorganizations should be reduced. If they only occurred every 5 years or so, people would have to time to get the bugs worked out and be working efficiently before everything changes again. This would lead to greater employee satisfaction and less burnout.

Current Employee – been working at Lafarge North America

Pros – Flexibility in work hours
Dynamic daily activities

Cons – Salaries slightly lower than other industries.

Advice to Senior Management – More separation in pay and benefits between your supervisor/coordinator level jobs and hourly workforce will lead to a more satisfied staff. It's quite common for supervisors to have direct reports that make considerable more in overall compensation once overtime is included. This is (the) largest reason why Lafarge cannot fill it's supervisor/coordinator level jobs with internal employees.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend