Compass Minerals Reviews

Current Employee – been working at Compass Minerals full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – Take work/home balance seriously.
Adequate pay for work done.
Annual review process is good.
Somewhat recession-proof.

Cons – Low salary increases, bonus structure is bad, require 110% performance.
Workload is sometimes overwhelming with no help in sight.
Company has not been meeting goals over the last several years.

Advice to Senior Management – The annual objectives do not reflect reality when employees are asked to meet theem.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Compass Minerals full-time for more than 10 years

Pros – Stable job, decent pay, somewhat flexible, nice building, good co-workers

Cons – Micro-managed, cannot move up without a degree, experience means nothing, too many bosses. Stress!

Advice to Senior Management – CEO's come in, get rich and leave. Guess it is that way at most companies. Low morale partially due to profit sharing being unattainable for workers; but Senior Management still gets all their perks. CEO told us we're disengaged if we had been there 3+ years and should do company a favor & quit. Started Gallup. HR does nothing to help morale. Before going public we had a lot fewer layers of management and job was less stressful. Very litte job satisfaction, lower morale now. Computer systems flawed. Need to invest in systems & people, everyone stressed. Hard when the CEO has his hand in everything and management cannot make a decision. Where is the B of D's in all this? Imagine someone coming around on New Years Eve at 4:30 to see who left early. Really! Where is trust?

Current Employee – been working at Compass Minerals full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – Recession proof products, Excellent workforce (for the most part), So much potential to be a GREAT company inspite of itself!

Cons – CEO and Leadership Team need to KEEP hiring qualified individuals to manage the company but then give them the authority and responsibility to manage their respective organizations without needing a 'hall pass' to go to the bathroom! The micro-management and ergo the disfunctionality is 'epic'

Advice to Senior Management – You have taken the time and spent the money to hire capable middle management. Allow them to do their jobs without so much unnecessary oversight, unsolicited advice and micro management! CMP Managers have years of experience and are capable of doing our jobs effectively! Hold us responsible for our mistakes and reward us for our successes, but just let us do what we know how to do!! Please remember thant it has been a long time since we were college interns....

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm optimistic about the outlook for this company

Current Employee – been working at Compass Minerals full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – Excellent employees at the plant. Significant potential for growth in the SOP business. Great location.

Cons – Senior Management is unprofessional and incompetent. Micro managing is unbelievable and is destroying the business. Vice Presidents make all the decisions and then blame the members of the "team" when their decision does not work. Public ridicule of Site Management is frequent by once Vice President and is leading to numerous resignations. What a great Company this could be if Senior Management would give middle management some authority to act.

Advice to Senior Management – Give middle managers at the sites the ability to run their location. Give them the authority and responsibility, hold them accountable.

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 Compass Minerals full-time for more than 10 years

Pros – Good salaries and decent benefits. The core employee base cares and wants to do well. Almost recession proof industry, so corporate layoffs are rare. CEO is leaving, so culture change is coming, which should be a good thing. Lots of potential here.

Cons – Way too many layers of management. Most people have dual reporting, which is confusing. Few middle managers have authority to make decisions, so it takes forever to get things done. Micro management by CEO. Management is more worried about the bottom line than customer satisfaction. Employee morale is low, but fixable. Company doesn't share it's success well with employees.

Advice to Senior Management – LISTEN!! Listen to your employees. Stop worrying only about the stock price. If you take care of your customers and employees, honor your obligations, don't oversell the plane and produce a quality product, the stock price will take care of itself. Business 101 can run this well positioned company.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Compass Minerals

Pros – The best reason to work at Compass in the end was it was a job with decent pay and with unemployment so high hard to find another job with comparable salary.

Cons – The downside is that after taking the Gallup Poll every year and seeing how unhappy the employees were even though their output was high leadership failed to see how they might actually be the root cause. Instead, they lectured employees and put them in Gallup meetings discussing goals. Employees feeling like it was punishment just went through the motions to get it out of the way. Leadership once asked in a meeting why or how could the employees be so unhappy. Senior management replied because you keep taking things away but don't give anything back.

Advice to Senior Management – Quit hiring management from a failed company and realize salt makes money because it snows not because you invest millions in a failed failed pool product line.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Compass Minerals

Pros – This is some really fun challenging work.. Loved all the people in my department.. A lot of outdoor work. flexible with comp time.

Cons – Corporate had no idea what they were doing. Trying to expand the company but not allowing a proper budget. It seemed that every week there was a new scope to projects. Would make changes in the middle of projects and not allow any more money. If corporate would disappear, and the board hired new management, it would be a great place to work.

Advice to Senior Management – Someone has to realize that corporate management is way over their heads. this is a very immature company and views the EPA as an enemy.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Compass Minerals

Pros – They pay their employees very well.
Morale starts out very strong, but surveys show it drops off dramatically after 3 years.

Cons – CEO is in the middle of everything, micro manages. No work/life balance.
They play "favorites" so don't expect fair treatment. Different rules for different people.

Advice to Senior Management – Trust your employees to make decisions.
Quit bringing in leadership from former failed business. If that business failed, it should
be a sign that somthing was wrong.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Compass Minerals

Pros – nice people and mostly pleasant environment

Cons – stress and negativity trickle down from management

Advice to Senior Management – Be more open to ideas from those that work for you.

Current Employee – been working at Compass Minerals

Pros – People that work here are very friendly. Nice, comfortable building. Good work/life balance.

Cons – Small company, and limited vision.

Advice to Senior Management – Trust the employees to do their job and empower them.