AeroVironment Reviews

Pros

2 weeks vacation and 2 weeks personal time to start. They also have a league they enter each year for company sports.

Cons

Little to no opportunity for internal advancement. Little to no written policies or procedures. Stuck in Simi Valley, which is far from the action.

Pros

You get to work some of the coolest SUAVS in the world.
The ability to live where you want in the USA when working in the Services Operator / Instructor side based out of Huntsville AL.

Cons

Managements inability to manage the schedule and the pay plan for the employees who work on the services and instructor side of the company.
No Vacation time earned even though you work more than other full time employees at the company. This applies to the services side based out of Huntsville AL.
Overseas travel to some of the most dangerous and awful places on the planet.
240 plus days on the road overseas at this High Threat areas.
Constantly changing policies and schedules
Biggest Con with the Huntsville AL. management: This used to be a great place to work.

Advice to Senior Management

Treat your employees the way you want to be treated.
Stop the ex military / combat control nepotism
Stop with the bullying management style.
Respect your workers and their lives.
Surround yourself with good people, not yes men.
Understand who the people are who make this company great and are the real reason you win contracts and reward them/us, not just yourself.

Pros

Interesting work. Fast paced. Good people mostly. High profile products that you can discuss with people and enjoy working on.

Cons

VERY un-organized, management is incredibly arrogant, foolish, and at times un-professional.

Advice to Senior Management

Fire VP's

Pros

You will be working with some very smart, very motivated people on the cutting edge of the newest field of aerospace and green electricity. Operations management is very efficient and well organized. There are no resource limitations - if you need a tool, book or other material resource, it will be provided with far less hassle than you're probably used to. The benefits are among the best in the industry, and the corporation is very employee oriented when it comes to work-life balance and employee social events. Company picnics and holiday parties are very well funded.

Cons

These same smart, motivated people can be very cliquish, very aloof, and very distrustful of anything "not invented here." There is a clear division between new hires and the old guard employees who were around before the company grew in size tenfold. Old-guard Engineering and Project managers are openly averse to adopting any lessons learned from outside the company. New hire managers are given little authority but much responsibility. AV's project-oriented management structure is not scaling to match the number of projects or personnel present and often struggles to staff small projects adequately. Employee annual review process is tedious and byzantine, yet no better in practice than the "what have you done for me lately" myopia typical industrywide. Day to day performance feedback is inconsistent at best, and often completely absent.

Advice to Senior Management

Shed your "not invented here" biases. Make it a top priority to improve day-to-day performance feedback to employees. Stop allowing senior management to fill multiple spots below them in their org charts, and hire experienced managers with people skills from other aerospace firms to fill them. Learn how a matrix organization works and adapt it to your company culture. Hire a senior level project manager from a large A&D firm to show you how to manage very large development programs. Delegate authority along with responsibility.

Pros

Great work/life balance.
Interesting work.
Great people who have fun at their jobs.
Great culture and great people.

Cons

Pay is a bit lower than other comparable companies unless you are in Senior Management, then it's very competitive.

Advice to Senior Management

Re-evaluate the staff's salaries. Offer stock options to employees.

Pros

The projects are innovative and exciting to be a part of; AeroVironment has been a leader in thier niche and received a number of awards.

Cons

AeroVironment rarely promotes from within; communications are not handled well; project deadlines are established by sales without regard to established timelines creating unnecessary fire drils and unhappy customers. Personal performance is not assessed by direct managers but rather by personnel who are unfamiliar with job descriptions, company projects and actual performance of individuals.

Advice to Senior Management

AV appears to be suffering from growing pains going from a small research company trying to compete with "the big boys." It appears certain decisions are being made for the immediate gain of top personnel rather than the long term growth, sustainability and profits for the company and employees.

Pros

1. Good and interesting projects.
2. See projects be designed, developed, and manufactured.

Cons

1. No structure. Constant and continuous change in management and employees.
2. Dog-eat-dog work environment.
3. Few opportunities in allowing employee to develop skills.
4. Management and HR are very poor in addressing employee concerns regarding growth and development of skills.
5. No job performance reviews.
6. Limited mentoring and training.

Advice to Senior Management

1. Do what you say and mean it in regards to culture and work environment.
2. Treat employees with respect and dignity.
3. Provide feedback to employees regarding work performance and expectations.
4. Allow employees to develop skills in the field they were hired to do.
5. Have managers with experience in the filed they are assigned to.

Pros

Employees treated well. Necessary equipment and tools are easy to obtain. Nice people.

Cons

Quick paced, a little too fast sometimes. Upper management too involved in project designs which disrupts things.

Advice to Senior Management

Be more personable with the engineers. Get to know the interns better.

Pros

Wonderful coworkers, use of company resources for personal projects.

Cons

Short term view of employee care and market.

Advice to Senior Management

Military funding is cyclical -- and we've been riding the wave for a while. How about devoting some resources to the future in terms of green energy? Use some of the talent pooled in Simi Valley over on the Energy projects in Monrovia -- or bring the projects to Simi!