Alcatel-Lucent Reviews in New York City, NY Area

Pros

Flexible hours and schedule enable the work/life balance and interesting challenges working with a diverse set of cultures. Very good training program.

Cons

No opportunity for growth, and there is a clear cultural divide between Europe and North America. We are burdened with the "If I didn't think of it, it's not a good idea" mentality. There are a number of employees that are just hanging on to try and get their pension. This is not only hurting the company, but also hurting morale for those that want to facilitate change. Being an American in a French organization is tough because the feedback we expect is different than that of the French.

Advice to Senior Management

Focus on simplifying the company. Many employees don't really understand our business. In addition, stop rewarding the "Old Telecom" mentality that is no longer working. We need to become much more agile and responsive to customers. Our Enterprise group needs to realize that what sells in Europe doesn't necessarily sell in the US.

Pros

technology and engineering staff, world class. amazing to know of all the great inventions that came out of this group (through bell labs), rich history of innovation and leadership. Most encounters I have had with the technical community have impressed me greatly for the level and depth of technical knoweldge and understanding of the technical market needset. Also the resources, deep pockets that comes with being part of an organization of this size

Cons

management decision-making. they had a world class technical team and lost many through attrition and poor management. offshoring hurt morale and productivity.

Advice to Senior Management

bring the greatness of the company back. telecom is not dead yet

Pros

There is great camarederie and respect amongst employees. My co workers are very experienced and create a very positive work environment.

Cons

There is little to no professional or career growth left in this company for the last 5-7 years. There is a constant threat of downsizing in the air and this is sapping the morale.

Advice to Senior Management

Take care of the employees and they will take care of the company. Senior Management has to realize that talent is the lifeblood of any technology company and by rewarding and nurturing the talent they can do wonders by building exceptional products. Senior Management should also not be afraid to go after new types of businesses which they dont do so readily these days.

Pros

The best reason to work for Alcatel-Lucent is the flexibility of the workplace.

Cons

Alcatel-Lucent has several problems:

Environment
Morale
Management communication

Advice to Senior Management

We should stop focusing on short term survival and make some bets on the future. We have let supply chain and now real estate rule the company. This has had a disastrous effect on our products and on employee morale. We need to produce cutting edge products, not just commodity products with approved low cost suppliers. This needs to be done in an environment which is conducive to doing world class development.

Pros

Limited reasons. It was a great place to work back in 2000, that ended quickly after the merger. The general mid level management is very strong and committed. The upper level management lacked vision and rarely passed down any significant strategy to the teams. I had the opportunity to travel to many different places and have always been grateful for that experience. When the work was there, it was interesting. However, there were long periods where work wasn't available and then periods when things needed to be done within a few hours. The benefits were good in terms of 401k, medical, dental, etc.

Cons

Limited opportunity for advancement for younger employees, lots of internal politics. After the merger opportunties lessened greatly. After the downturn in 2000, a lot of people were just there to get a paycheck. You had people that just wanted to wait it out until they hit their pension window. Some even kept a countdown outside their office. Once Alcatel got involved, policies changed without any input from US based management. They were difficult to work with and basically reversed a lot of the positive trends we had started. Anyone young left during the bust and the ones that wanted to be loyal were wasting their time. Executives rarely change there and upward mobility was a joke.

Advice to Senior Management

Get a forward looking strategy!

Pros

Great portfolio, tons of great innovations, great potential to build the best networks and applications to allow amazing user experiences.

We are in a very exciting time as many industries are converging and partnering, be it the Telecom, Consumer Electronics, Internet, Advertising and IT worlds. This creates huge opportunities where ALU has experience and can lead existing and new customers be more relevant and successful.

Cons

There are some really great people and great products. Alcatel Lucent can pull from experience in enterprises and carriers around the world like nobody else can... but there is currently a lack of communication, lack of top exec direction, mixed with a good amount of politics. All of this results in less than ideal productivity and creativity from the best employees.

Advice to Senior Management

Please share the vision for our great company to lead in the transformation that our industry is undergoing, and be bold enough to invest in areas that will secure our 3-5 years+ future.

Pros

Continued employment with Alcatel-Lucent adds to the bottom line of the pension.

Cons

Career and Alcatel-Lucent are antonyms. Long term prospects at ALU do not appear bright if you are a North America Region employee. Between constant quarterly 'synergy' layoffs and the accelerated attrition, morale is such that people are working in a fully depressed environment. Couple that with a lack of pay increase or bonus for what is now going on 3 years and it gets very difficult to view an upside.

Advice to Senior Management

Synergize yourselves first - no leadership would be better than the bad leadership currently in place. It is utterly amazing that one can keep their job by providing such a lack of vision that the company is literally hemorrhaging it's staff.

Pros

None at this point. The infighting between corporate organizations and the Business Groups and Regional teams is demoralizing, counter productive and is cutting careers short. Leadership is lost and the focus is on protecting one's turf, rather than solving customer problems.

Cons

Poor communication between New Jersey and Paris senior management staffs. Too many political battles between senior management teams, between the regions and New Jersey and the Business Groups and New Jersey.

Advice to Senior Management

Step in and show some leadership on resolving the problems between the CMO organization and the rest of the company. Pick a way to go and make that the decision. This concept of 'let them work it out' is not working, has not worked for 18 months, and will not resolve itself in the near future. Disappointed that Pat has not put her foot down but has instead let these problems continue and fester. The company is poorer for it.