IDEXX Laboratories, Inc. Reviews

Current Employee – been working at IDEXX Laboratories, Inc. full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – Learned a lot quickly, Understanding of hardships, good hours, good people mostly

Cons – Favouritism and not enough unity on different shifts

Advice to Senior Management – Needs better communication between the satellite labs and the Maine lab

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at IDEXX Laboratories, Inc. full-time for less than a year

Pros – My chair was soft. I had my own desk. There was often free food. It was modern and clean.It was better than unemployment and losing my house. I am not exaggerating when I say these were the only positives.

Cons – NO room for real job growth. I was misled about that from the interview until the day I gave notice. Wage to work ratio is a joke. Training was incredibly poor. Elitism. Cronyism. Idexx takes talented, enthusiastic employees, wrings out all that is good in what they do, then stomps on them until they crawl through the revolving door. I saw work lives ruined, though thankfully not my own. Do not leave a better job for any position at IDEXX; accept a job here only as your last resort.

Advice to Senior Management – You must be doing something right, because you're happy while the rest of the people beneath you are miserable.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at IDEXX Laboratories, Inc. full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – IDEXX has a lot of great people who foster a highly innovative work environment. Quality science is valued. There are always lots of exciting interdisciplinary projects to work on and contribute to. Southern Maine is a great location for families - safe and lots of activities.

Cons – Being a high growth company, IDEXX is a high pressure atmosphere. The workload at times is way too much given that compensation is low for scientists in the Biotech field. The low compensation is due to the lack of biotech industry employers in the area. Even though Boston is 90 mins away it is definitely a completely separate employment market.

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

Former Employee – worked at IDEXX Laboratories, Inc. full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – Good pay, work that means something.

Cons – Management can resemble an ol' boys club.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at IDEXX Laboratories, Inc. full-time for less than a year

Pros – Seems Like a Good company.

Cons – Unorganized Managment. Disconnect from what other companies are doing as far as "The Interview Process Goes" Extremely unnecessary Process. Lack of Communication.

Advice to Senior Management – This is for new hires only. Please explain the process a little better. Communicate thoroughly about the hiring process as well as the interviewing process. There are other companies out there that would love to hire employees like us. Please value new employees more. Thank you. Good luck new employees!

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at IDEXX Laboratories, Inc. full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – Decent money if you negotiate right, benefits, stock options

Cons – Incredibly disorganized, lower employees are all treated like dirt, HR is inept and incompetent.

I worked with this company as a technician and supervisor in several of their locations for years only to leave in disgust. I was tired of having to hire people at insulting wages while employees that had an "in" with management got paid ridiculous amounts of money. I didn't like forcing my employees to work six or seven days a week because we weren't allowed to hire an appropriate level of staffing and then hear about increased overtime wages and not meeting TAT at my monthly business review meetings. And I REALLY didn't like HR doing a piss-poor job of investigating any and all personnel conflicts until their own jobs were threatened.

Each reference laboratory has its own set of rules and guidelines. Some labs (usually the smaller ones under the radar) have decent managers and supervisors and are pretty nice to work at. Some of the larger labs use employees until they're completely burned out, and then discard them. And God help you if you work in the Memphis lab. I mean, seriously, God help you.

Upper management (GM and directors) have no clue who you are, but that doesn't stop them from coming by once every couple of years to stay in nice hotels, eat out and gamble every night, and drive expensive rental cars while simultaneously telling you they can't afford a new hematocrit centrifuge. All employee parties and events were cancelled many years ago out of budget restrictions and travel was also restricted a couple years back (sometimes they'll let you have a holiday potluck). They tell you in one breath that they can't afford any of these things, and then force you to sit through staff meetings where they pat themselves on the back for having a record year for profit.

Don't even get me started on LEAN. Useless, money and time wasting program with zero follow through.

If you are a doctor, have a decent title in Westbrook, or work as an upper manager you are treated extremely well, but if you're a regular working joe you are treated like absolute garbage - which is why half the reviews are great on here and the rest are awful. IDEXX has this fantasy that they treat their employees decently, but that's because anyone who complains is labelled as a negative troublemaker and denied advancement opportunities and promotions. Unless you are full of sunshine and rainbows, for the love of god don't open your mouth if you want to keep working here.

Upper level managers and directors will often be found on their computers chatting, leaving early, coming in late, taking hour or so long lunches. Bottom level employees can be found working 12 hour shifts, not taking lunch or even bathroom breaks, and getting berated for missing TAT or getting too much OT. "We work hard so you don't have to" should be IDEXX's slogan.

They offer just enough money above what other companies offer just to entice people in the door and then keep them at that wage for years. I have been forced to give employees literally 2 cent raises. A "good" raise is probably around 30 cents for most technicians. This is why you see reviews stating people get hired in making more than people who have been there for years.

I wouldn't recommend working here if you have an active family life. It is VERY frowned upon to take time off or leave early for family functions, and they will NOT pay you your sick time for any reason other than you being sick. If your car won't start, or the lab is open in a snowstorm and you can't make it, if your child is ill or you don't have daycare for the day, you will not get paid for that day. Some labs MAY let you use vacation time if you have any left, but they are within their rights to make you take it unpaid. And they will.

However, if you are a motivated person who seriously wants to dedicate your life to your job and don't care about corporate culture, IDEXX is the place for you. They do offer good benefits and stock options, as well as 401k matching. They are happy to promote you as long as you are fast and efficient to their guidelines and always tell them what they want to hear, and fire who they want you to fire, and hire who they want you to hire, and agree with all of their policies.

Advice to Senior Management – Actually care about your staff and employees, don't just give lip service to this ideal. Completely overhaul and rework your HR department. Have some compassion and listen. And for the love of god, STOP telling us how you can't afford basic things that are necessary to do our job. You are a billion dollar biotech company. Grow up and start acting like it.

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 IDEXX Laboratories, Inc. full-time

Pros – Stable employment in a State where there are very few opportunities for real careers and earnings.

Cons – Eight years ago this place was too good to be true. Over the last three to four years it has taken a turn for the worst. Like many other reviews, most of the departments are run by managers with personal agendas and clearly look at employees as easily replaceable in a downturn economy. The company has tried to offset some of the negative employee issues with a "My Voice" survey given to employees the last two years. What I have seen is a lot of talk about some of the key issues and no tangible movement to resolve any of them.

In my department, Facilities, the same key issues of trust/respect, accountability and the willingness to speak up were repeat issues. The managers in Facilities are clueless on how to even start to deal with these items. Our department has essentially been leaderless with no clear direction for over three years. Our former Director left about 6 months ago but prior to this he allowed his middle managers to run amok and sending employees off in all directions with no purpose or common goals. We get things done out of necessity but in a manner that is dysfunctional and costly with back stabbing, gossiping and undermining each other the norm. There is a current effort to replace the Director, which most are hoping will get us back on track. Unfortunately there are a few of the dysfunctional middle managers that have applied for this position. If any of them get hired for the position it would be a disaster for our department and the company. We NEED someone to come in and clean house, clean up the lack of accountability, stop middle management personal agendas from guiding us and get everyone in Facilities pointed in the right direction. We are hoping to have this new leadership in place by Q1 (2013). I am optimistic that things will work out. In the meantime I am looking outside of IDEXX for opportunities if the slide continues in our department.

Advice to Senior Management – It's too bad that you cannot put yourself in your employee's shoes to see what is really going on at the ground floor. Not sure what you are going to do when the economy does really turn around and you have a mass exodus of employees walking out the door. Now is when you want to fix the problems before things are too late.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at IDEXX Laboratories, Inc. full-time for more than a year

Pros – Growth of stock price and business profitability
Nice co-workers and good job security

Cons – lack of advancement due to shortage of staff to back fill position
pay was not competitive for the amount of responsibility

Advice to Senior Management – Don't oversell the advancement opportunities

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

Former Employee – worked at IDEXX Laboratories, Inc. full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – As a Software Support Tech I made double minimum wage, which was about the only thing I liked abou the job

Cons – In this department, the hours varied between 6:30 AM an 8:00 PM (so hard to find childcare for this reason!) and although it is 'supposed' to be based on seniority, you could be schedule for any shift. You end up working more weekends and holidays then they initially let on. The job itself was pretty stressful and the supervisors were unhelpful. New people started out with higher salary than older workers...high turnaround because even though they say they do, you get the impression the company does NOT value it's employees. Also, there wasn't really room to 'move up' in the company. I applied to several different positions but only received lateral movement.

Advice to Senior Management – VALUE THE EMPLOYEES YOU HAVE. Give the employees that have been there a while higher wages, better hours, and start the new ones off slightly lower. Also fix the all the software bugs in Cornerstone before trying to come out with new features/releases. Customers get extremely frustrated with this, and so do the frontline call centers who have to deal with these customers.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at IDEXX Laboratories, Inc. full-time for more than 10 years

Pros – if negotiated well and lucky you get good wage and benefits,not guaranteed !!.

Cons – --Full of managers playing politics ,with complete disregard for existing employees (R&D)
--No respect for current full time employees ,so no company loyalty built,every one tries to get his head in the game.
--all talk no action.
--Contractors given more importance than 15-20yrs exp employees.
--forget on promotions unless you can do some politics.

Advice to Senior Management – --Take some action dont just talk
--value your existing employees ,they are the best resource
--Hire talented managers ,

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend