Cymer Reviews

Pros

Newer facilities, secured parking, cafeteria, some nice folks to work with, convenient location for me.

Cons

Organizationally it is way too top-heavy. Too many V.P.'s, Sr. Directors, etc.

Advice to Senior Management

Rumors swirling that a lay-off i scoming early 2012. Sales are down in DUV. Let people know early. Families are affected.
Cut some senior level wood this time.

Bring back the quarterly profit sharing plan; do away with the once a year plan.

Pros

Hard work and dedication are often recognized and rewarded
There are high expectations for everyone who works at this company, which means your co-workers are generally both competent and personable.
Executives/Supervisors are extremely hands on and approachable
The company understands very well that the details count and it is extremely rare to see anyone cut corners.

Cons

The third party companies we sometimes need to go through to order supplies are often a waste of both time and money.

Advice to Senior Management

Cut out some of the middle-men who supply us when going directly to the source could save both time and money. This could streamline not only that process, but also the resulting workflows as well.

Pros

Good pay & work enviroment

Cons

There is no royalties and care for employees within senior amanagement

Advice to Senior Management

Backup you tell the upper management about individual talents that work under you.

Pros

Cymer treats its interns well, including being recognized as a colleague and being given meaningful projects to work on. Bonuses for interns include a Padres game, day at the beach, and multiple learning events.

Cons

Cymer is a cubicle city, which stifles conversation and collaborating a little more than I'd prefer.

Pros

Good location in San Diego
Interesting technology in a dynamic industry, which is clearly striving to keep up with Moore's law.

Cons

Highly incompetent, egocentric executive management, with an extremely poor ability to make decisions.
They treat employees very badly, burn them out with excessive workloads, impossible schedules. There is a strong blame culture and individuals are not rewarded for good work.
No real opportunities for career path, except if you leave the company and come back.
No willingness to show an degree of reasonableness. Seems to get worse with time.
Reliability of technology is extremely poor from a chipmaker's perspective.

Advice to Senior Management

Start to value and respect your employees, and reduce the no of personal attacks on individuals, and obvious favoritism. Employ individuals at the senior management level who clearly have ability, and not because they are friends with VP, or senior director.

Pros

Successful within the industry. Innovative products. Nice building.

Cons

Company does not invest in infrastructure or technology outside of product areas. No professional development opportunities. l Has a tendency to hire from outside rather than grow and promote from within.

Advice to Senior Management

. Too much emphasis and reliance on metrics reporting rather than actually talking with employees to find out what is going on.

Pros

Good weather and location. This is a tech company and the culture is overwhelmingly techie. The scientists are genuinely motivated by the technology.

Cons

Too many VP's. Most of them are uninspiring and full of platitudes.

No real career path. HR is non-supportive with most requests. Performance reviews aren't put to any real use.

The technology isn't easily transferable. You might have trouble landing your next job if you want to do something else. Company is relatively unknown outside the industry.

The technology moves so fast that there is little or no process to anything. Their lasers often break down in the field, and since almost nobody in the entire company understands the entire system, everyone is constantly in panic mode.

Highly cyclical industry. Layoffs are commonplace here.

Advice to Senior Management

1. The CEO is a good man, but the only time he is seen is when he makes his refined, albeit boilerplate, speech during quarterly meetings. Have him engage more with his people.

2. Find a replacement COO from the outside who can do more than just talk.

3. Provide more training opportunities for employees. Have leaders look at how things are done outside Cymer.

4. Conduct an unbiased search for the true gems in the midst bring them out from the shadows and give them more responsibilities.

5. Spend more effort in looking at alternative applications of the technology. The 'applications' team has not been very effective with this so far.

Pros

Cymer offerrs unlimited career opportuity and advancement for those willing to work hard and smart. Manages the downturns well and is consistentlyi the technology leader.

Cons

If you want a career where showing up is 90% of the job, then Cymer is not the place for you. It is expected that employees all be engaged with the company goals and work industriously to acheive them.

Pros

Cymer has all the makings for a great company. It's a locally founded technology company. Strong market position and good business fundamentals. Beautiful campus and buildings, good benefits, wonderful workforce. Many talented, remarkable scientists.

Cons

Zero empowerment for most managers and technologists. Top executives exhibit a know-it-all mentality, even though almost all are not technologists.

Advice to Senior Management

Replace COO with a strong technical executive and one with charisma to motivate and encourage the organization.

Put emphasis on encouraging risk-taking and push decisions down into organization.

Reduce number of VPs by one-half. Far too many VPs for a company of Cymer's size.

Pros

Nice office environment -- building won architectural awards.
Innovative and smart coworkers.
Can-do attitude of team members and management.
Industry and market leading company.

Cons

Extremely cyclical industry.
One main product contributes to revenue so far.
Too dependent on a few main customers who are much larger than Cymer.

Advice to Senior Management

Balance praise and criticism.
Positive feedback or celebration of wins are too rare.
Reinstate quarterly bonuses.
More carrots, less stick.