GE-Hitachi Nuclear Energy Reviews

Pros

Great group of people in Arnprior. Currently setting up an information share within the Canadian sites, as well as the Wilmington site. Very small site, so employees must be willing to take on many roles, this allows for a variety of projects. Very stable especially for manufacturing. Orders are placed for several years in advance. Competitive benefits.

Cons

Because of the small work force, if you're good at something you'd better like doing it. Small town plant politics can be a challenge. A lot of changes currently going on, makes for interesting times. Lack of benefits for maternity/paternity leaves.

Advice to Senior Management

Keep bringing in new blood. It's not your job to be liked.

Pros

Good engineering work environment for experienced engineer.

Cons

high regulated and tight project schedule and very slow, But it is nuclear industry.

Advice to Senior Management

Need more practical training program for new employee

Pros

Smart people who want to deliver a high quality product
Good opportunity to experience different things every day at different locations

Cons

1. Crap Health Insurance
2. Loss of GE Stock to fidelity fund which is worthless to us
3. Zero closure on employee concerns from management
4. Total lack of Home office support when requested
5. Customers always come first, employee's needs always come last

Advice to Senior Management

Ask yourselves why there is a big exodus from GEH to competitors. The customer's see that morale is non-existent, why can't managment?

Pros

Laid back environment
flexible working arrangements
decent pay
Current senior management has brought up moral in the company. Exceptional improvement from two years ago.

Cons

new health care package is horrible.
difficult to get work done
glacial processes
Technical engineers are not adequately compensated. This is because of too many layers of management.

Advice to Senior Management

walk the walk

Pros

Broad Exposure to many project aspects.

Cons

Lack of Consistentcy with Training

Advice to Senior Management

More structure and accountability for projects.

Pros

The pay was great and the work I was assigned to complete was simple, not a lot of stress over many deadlines.

Cons

The work was not fulfilling, it really felt like it was a waste of my time. I never really had any pride from the work that I had accomplished. Everyone is either about to retire or waiting for death. Avg age of employee's were mid 60s.

Advice to Senior Management

It is too easy to fly under the radar here undetected. Not much accountability over their employees or what gets completed and when.

Pros

Just left my post at GEH after being there for the last 4 years. The nuclear renaissance was headline 4 years ago and now due to the economic crisis, things are a lot quieter and opportunities lost, not to mention due to budget shortfall in late'08, early '09, the many layoffs presented to the myriad contractors. Although the company has so far upkept their promise not to layoff direct hires and only few were let go during the eonomic storm.

I left for reasons of project stalemate and lost opportunities due to budget cut. Communication from the top is just like other places where it's never sufficient, people were often left in the dark except the once-a-quarter "Employee Mtg" where employees are briefed about the financial outlook and status of the company in general. You're certainly free to go to your supervisor if you're curious to find out about statuses more frequently than the Qtrly meetings, but depending on whom you ask, they may not know much more than you do.

Health benefits is top notch, this I realize after going to another company. There're plenty of internal email memos from Corp. about work-balance seminars to attend and other benefits info, so I think on this front GEH and GE in general are doing fairly well.

Overall, I have a fairly positive remarks for the company for it's a great company to have graduated from and appear on your resume, as far as the communication, work environment and the impasse in nuclear industry, that's prevalent in the industry so GEH is not alone to be blamed.

I would recommend people to work for GEH.

Cons

large company mentality
lack of motivation to get things done
lack of communication from atop

Advice to Senior Management

I understand sometimes you do not want to advise the employees of yet-to-released news, but communication about company status more frequent than once every quarter will help and alleviate people's anxiety about job outlook and stability, esp. during the economy crisis.

Pros

Very flexible and accomodating on work schedule as long as job is done.

Cons

Business is a bit disjointed, management is not good at getting teams to coordinate.

Advice to Senior Management

Get more teams together, share engineering and business decisions as soon as they are made, along with the reasons the decision was made.

Pros

Health Insurance, benefits, flexible work schedule..etc GE due ot its large size and base of employees can negotiate much better benfits with
Having the name of GE on your resume looks extremely good in your future career, esp for people like myself with only 3 yrs of engineering experience

Cons

GE-Hitachi, formerly, GE Nuclear before the alliance, has not delivered any Nuke in the last 30 yrs due to domestic animosity, economic, political and social climate that were unfavorable to Nuclear energy. As such, the management group were formed fairly recently (< 4 years) and have no major project management experience. As of Aug'08 I think the management still has plenty of things to do to make Nuclear Renaissance possible!

Advice to Senior Management

Start making decision
Know that the morale is low and start communicating what you are thinking, the long term vision and how you envision to accomplish the engineering tasks...