Pros

Money is much better than I earned before, but not competitive with the oil companies. Benefits are good, and there is decent opportunity for growth. All in all the business culture is professional, and the technology and equipment reliability have come a long way.

Cons

Personnel are typically controlled at the regional level, so your boss will try to hang onto you if you are good. Many good employees are not able to be transferred or promoted because their local manager wants to hang onto them for selfish reasons.

Advice to Senior Management

Control personnel from the top down, and make more strategic moves to keep people fresh and give them varied experiences. Many people tend to get into a rut if they stay in one position longer than 3 years or so. Do a better job of providing feedback. Performance review system needs a lot of work. Don't keep people from moving if they are willing.

Pros

Halliburton offers many different options, and a varied amount of jobs. Very open for you to move where you want to go in the world. Field training is very good.

Cons

Communication isn't always the best. Management structure is very confusing. Too much wasted money. too much to do and not enough people to do it.

Advice to Senior Management

fix the structure of management. This would fix most of the communication problems, and would allow the management team to be more involved in projects instead of just involved in the projects that are late. You could fix this by simply adding 1 layer of management or something like a 1st step management layer.

Pros

One of the greates advantages of working for Halliburton is definitely the compensation package and benefits. The salary is slight higher than the average for interns in Brazil, but the company provided me with lots of benefits, including accomodation at a very good hotel.

Though I worked only for 2 months, it was clear that there are lots of opportunities for career growth within the company. I know that once you join as an Engineer you go through some trainings overseas and that these trainings are of very good quality. I also came to know that Engineers who worked for Halliburton are highly appraised by other Oil and Gas companies.

Cons

I was absolutely lost during my first days at the company. What's more, the manager who had interviewed me 1 month earlier did not remember me... I was completely bafflled...

Moreover, as I was a summer intern working only for a period of 2 months they assigned me to some jobs that I did not really appreciate... During virtually the whole internship I was cleaning the tools, replacing O-rings and carrying out other basic functions... I learned a little a bit about the tools, but I was expecting something more challenging.

Advice to Senior Management

Please, do care about your summer interns! It's an absurd that the manager who interviewed me did not remember me at first..

Pros

My coworkers were the best part of the ten years. I felt that I was surrounded by a great group of people who really all cared and looked out for one another.

Cons

Some of the management decisions over the years were interesting. Higher level management does not appear to care for the lesser employees.

Advice to Senior Management

It is always the lower level employees who shoulder the majority of the brunt work, and that should be remembered when making decisions.

Pros

Ample amount of time off. Workload can be high, but much less than Schlumberger (where I worked for 7 years in a similar role).

Fantastic people, that are not as vilified or mechanized as Halliburton's competition, Schlumberger.

Cons

Where is the technology? Definitely not the leader in the industry with respect to most processes, tools, software... etc. The potential is there, but not realized.

I did not feel challenged in the company. So much so, that I had to leave.

Advice to Senior Management

Invest more profit back into research. Communicate scandal more effectively to employees and shareholders (the latest Nigeria ''payment'' is not clear). Remove the scandals and their associated ''payments'' to improve employee morale and use these funds to improve working environments for employees.

Pros

Great when Oil is on the upswing. In some instance you can make your own way through the company.

Cons

It's the good-ol-boy network in spades. It's not what you know it's who you know. Also, if you get a little on the old side they want to shove you out the door.

Advice to Senior Management

Figure out how to make money while having morals at the same time. I know it's difficult because the stock holders have you by the nuts but at least pretend to be decent.

Pros

Excellent pay and management is understanding of the need for time off on most occasions. Very little micromanaging in some groups.

Cons

The communication is terrible between groups. There is no "email discipline" at all....you will find a chain a mile long, and the people commenting at the top of the chain and issuing orders have no idea and do not read the start of the chain to understand the issue. At least 50% of my time is spent explaining something to an executive or internal customer because he "heard" a rumor about something....very frustrating.

Advice to Senior Management

Hire competent people, set their high level goals, and then get out of the way and let them do their job. If they can't handle that, then find someone who can.

Pros

Laid back work environment with a very casual office dress code attire. Its like its always Friday over here.

Definite no. 1 position in the market. The contracts just keep on coming in even when the oil price is low.

Highly advanced technology applied in their products.

Job stability and security. Impact of the global recession hasn't been as bad as the other service companies.

Cons

The money is next to nothing.

Organization is so big, its more "business first" then "people first"

Has a crazy rule of business travelling can only be in coach. Imagine a 12 hour flight in coach.

Need to cut throat back stab 20+ people just to get a promotion. Even sometimes it really is just up to the boss about who gets promoted without any particular measure of merit.

Not really an equal opportunity employer.

Turnover is high. Young talented engineers just come and go...

Advice to Senior Management

Should really try to be more people oriented instead of business oriented.

Pros

Halliburton is great when the oil is flowing, but when oil production slows, you better start lookin for another job.

Cons

Too much uncertainty on a day to day basis as to whether or not you would be there at the end of the month.

Advice to Senior Management

Some of the management at Halliburton were definitely not qualified for the positions of which they held, also too much grandfathering took place.

Pros

Lots of good projects to work on and great colleagues to work with. Compensation is OK and benefits are pretty good. Great place for minorities and women to work since they will be given preference for promotions.

Cons

Management is on the war path to outsource all IT work to India and this is putting all IT jobs in jeopardy including positions working with SAP which had previously been safe. Not a great place for non-minorities and non-women to work at since minorities and women will be given preference for promotions. Job security at Halliburton is non-existent and there are no exceptions. Even top managers and VP's get pushed out at the whim of executive management whenever they get a bug up their arse.

Advice to Senior Management

Get rid of the CIO who doesn't care about lower-level employees. Stop the rush to outsource all IT functions to India. Step back and select the most appropriate functions to be moved to India.