Jacobs Engineering Reviews

Pros

the hole workers and my seiniors were very helpfull..

Cons

work load were very high on me.

Advice to Senior Management

thnx.............

Pros

Professional environment, decent salary and benefits, the safety and health of employees is important to senior management.

Cons

Office politics. Not enough recognition or advancement for women.

Advice to Senior Management

Start promoting more qualified women.

Pros

Flexible work hours. After you hold some big projects to yourself, you can do nothing with everybody working hard for you. Network and good relationship with important clients and managers are critical.

Cons

Jacobs doesn't care about their employees. Internal competition is intense. And all they care is billable hours and projects. Turnover rate of junior staff is insanely high.

Advice to Senior Management

People should be promoted based on their capabilities and performance instead of the relationship with senior managers. Pay people reasonable salaries.

Pros

It is not a job that will have you put in extra hours, or force you to take work home. The position is hourly, so you get paid for the work you do. It is a generally lax atmosphere, so you are not put to task very often. Good place for an easy, steady paycheck that you can get without exerting yourself or having to ever even use your brain.

Cons

If you are looking to build a career, and learn new skills, this is not the place to do it. They do a lot of good work in engineering, and are cutting edge, but the support departments like IT and Accounting are largely just around to do the bare minimum. This is not a good place to be if you are not in the core departments. Also, the politics will get to you. That is a guarantee.

Advice to Senior Management

If you are going to hire top talent, do not put them to waste by making them work menial tasks. Hire interns for that.

Pros

Decent hourly pay rate
Adequate benefits package
401(k) match and stock options
That's pretty much it. They compensate well for the work we do. Don't expect more.

Cons

Weak management practices lead to incompetent people getting ahead, while truly proficient, dedicated workers get dismissed. Often times, there is no supervision and the "right" people take advantage of this by acting-out antics and unethical behavior.

Advice to Senior Management

I really don't think the leadership cares to hear any of my advice, nor do I care to give it. I'm not going to waste anymore thoughts on this company.

Pros

Good pay, good people, good location, lots of focus on safety (almost to the point of being annoying)

Cons

Easy to fall into a routine depending on your job, not particularly exciting work, interfacing with the civil/government side of things can be annoying, but is necessary

Pros

Offers good work life balance opportunities.

Cons

UK Senior Management is old fashioned. A lot of junior staff see no room for growth among a thick layer of management populated by the over 55s. Obviously busineses need a wide range of ages and experience amongst employees, however, it is very segregated into two camps at Jacobs. Very few opportunities to bid for work or try to grow business - work is solely distributed among various teams by senior management. Sometimes there's not enough work to go around and billing time appropriately turns into a game.You are encouraged to bill time to professional development, yet supervisors won't support actual professional development courses.
Obsessed with health and safety.

Advice to Senior Management

Listen to employees under 40. American management should be more engaged with UK workforce to encourage diversity in the workplace. Also be more supportive of female employee growth and opportunities.

Pros

The office location is convenient. Flexible hours. Most of the employees are good. The salary is fair.

Cons

Too top heavy with many overlaps. Delegate and deflect seems to be the name of the game when it comes to responsibilities. Pretending like you know what you are doing gets you further than actually doing good work.

Advice to Senior Management

Get rid of some of the "dead weight". Put on you BS detector and get to know the good employees from the fakes.

Pros

Jacobs has over 60,000 employees located all over the world. That means great job opportunities if you are flexible. There are so many opportunities if you are flexible. The company is very inclusive and has an awesome Women's Collaborative operating world-wide.

Cons

Jacobs is the same as other engineering and construction companies. You have to make your own opportunities and make sure that your career desires are well known. Management is open to this and asks for feedback in their leadership resource planning process.
Employees just have to fill in the blanks.

Advice to Senior Management

Stay the course and continue to grow the company. Integation of acquisitions is awesome and employees are well treated. Don't change this process. Continue to provide training and communication from senior management down. Show employees its a great place to work.

Pros

9 hour days with every other Friday off.

Cons

Nepotism and favoritism run rampant in the IT department in Houston. If you get hired in IT and you are not one of the few that make it into "the club", you won't last long. Management doesn't know the meaning of honesty or fairness. Benefits are well below average for a large company in Houston. No bonuses of any kind here, not even a Christmas party.

Advice to Senior Management

Hire all new IT managers in the Houston office. Give back more to your employees and they will be happier and more productive.