Alliant Energy Reviews

Pros

The compensation, medical/dental benefits, vacation, etc., are absolutely wonderful. Very friendly atmospher. Enjoy the work that I do and everyone that I work with.

Cons

Would like to see more workforce so we are able to focus on recruiting instead of paper processing.

Advice to Senior Management

Would like to see more workforce so we are able to focus on recruiting instead of paper processing.

Pros

~ There are some great people that work within the company and some are happy to assist when necessary.
~ Pay, when I was there, was pretty competitive and at times, may have exceeded industry standards.

Cons

~ TOO many LAZY contracted employees
~ Management does not give the company employees the benefit of the doubt
~ Benefits are not the greatest considering the bottom line
~ Many other cons that cannot be shared in this forum

Advice to Senior Management

My advice to management is to realize how valuable your TRUE employees are and to TRUST them. Stop paying contractors and use the local resources!! When you pay individuals without skills, abilities and devotion more than you pay your own employees, well, that is just ridiculous!!
I truly like Bill Harvey and have worked with him several times so I do not blame his leadership...I blame the hiring managers and department "leaders"!!

Pros

good benefits
good community sponsor of events
regulated so they couldn't "special treat customers" everyone was the same

Cons

a lot of tenured employees therefore they had a sense of entitlement. they would not think or work outside of their comfort zone. just skating by to get their retirement in.
favoritism in certain departments -praise and extra training was based on who you know and not what you know or had a willingness to learn.
everything was measured in dollars and not morale. too many changes and lay-offs every 2 years. motivated by fear and not values.

Advice to Senior Management

diversity is great but not when you openly reverse discriminate because your corporate directive is to scrap a job posting if you don't have a 25% diverse candidate pool.

Pros

Decent flexibility in hours and job. Flex time comes and goes, but I was able to attend real personal needs outside of the office with little problem or pestering. Abusing this is one sure way to get on the black list with middle management. Expectations on employees are set to account for the average, so a competent person, with some skill and experience can handle expected work load with little problem (not quite true since 2009/2010 due to cost cutting).

Cons

Complacent work force. It's very hard to push any area into tech refresh. Most is 10 years behind what more agile shops consider to be advanced but very stable. Management talks to non-management folks using language and reasoning that is appropriate when addressing grade school kids, not adult work force. Note - this is not a bad place to work, but make sure you understand how utilities work, and learn how to deal with complex work environment.

Pros

Great place to work, have a lot opportunity grow. Get bonus

Cons

The promotion paste is very slow

Advice to Senior Management

Alliant Energy is a great place to work, with a lot of opportunity young professional. The management always willing to help you grow and learn about the utility business.

Pros

Alliant provides competitive pay and benefits

Cons

old school, resistance to change

Advice to Senior Management

flexibility to those producing results

Pros

Salary, nice building, good benefits. Overall the people are great at Alliant. Management is very much a click and unapproachable at least from my perspective but they keep to themselves so that is not a problem unless you want to be one of them.

Cons

Employee are just that. You are treated well but noting special. When I say that, I mean to say I personally feel like the expectation is to do your job and be efficient and quiet about it.

Advice to Senior Management

Be more open with employees. The team feeling is gone and most worker bees feel like a number and unappreciated.

Pros

The wages were fair, benefits were good, and the Company ran like a well oiled machine. The union did a lot of good for the employees.

Cons

Many of the employees may have never worked outside of Alliant Energy, which is actually a downfall to themselves. They need to know how other companys work to understand that they've got it pretty good with Alliant Enegy.

Advice to Senior Management

I can't imagine why employees have such a hard time with Management. Compared to the management of 10 - 20 years back, the new management seems to be well informed and courteous toward us "worker bees".

Pros

Good benefits, nice place to work.

Cons

They have their 'favorites' and if you are not one of them, you are subject to 'downsizing'.

Advice to Senior Management

When you let someone go, at least tell them why! Don't just give the excuse of 'downsizing'. Especially when less then a year later you hire for the same position again!!!

Pros

-Pay for being a customer service rep in Cedar Rapids is better than other places in town
-Co-workers (non-management) are great people

Cons

-Horrific scheduling by a scheduler who doesn't know what he is doing half the time. Nobody likes their schedule changing weekly with one day being 30 minute lunch, next 60 minute lunch, the next you forgot to even schedule...etc
-Management doesn't communicate well to reps, thats when and if you can find them at their desk even, or their usually in one of their hundred meetings to plan more meetings.
-We DON'T need air conditioning in the winter, seriously.
-Management announces change to make rep life easier, drag out implementation of change for at least a year to make it as painful as possible.
-Management announces that a change that can negatively effect a rep's ranking will get a one month announcement before it goes into effect, then try to slide it under the radar and have it be two months retroactive against your stats.
-No growth in the company from a position in customer service. All the job postings are always looking for people with 3-5+ years in a ultra specific field that instantly cuts out any possibility of growth out of the call center.
-No bonuses for 2 years running

Advice to Senior Management

Learn to communicate with your employees better, get a better scheduler than you have, make it better to grow with the company