Medtronic Reviews

Pros

Strong management and good job training as well as opportunities for growth
very competent group of supporting engineers
Very good treatment of employees in terms of benefits and details such as the gymnasium and cafeteria

Cons

Long hours and it is a very large company with excessive bureaucracy
much of the upper management is overly concerned with politics within the company
strong disconnect between the Mexico, USA, Ireland and Puerto Rico divisions

Advice to Senior Management

look to a higher plowback ratings to further encourage and fuel the R and D department so that innovations continue to be the central part of the company

Pros

The Mission: helping those in need is extremely satisfying. Working in the field exposes you to a variety of uncomfortable situations which all help you grow and develop in sales and customer interaction.

Cons

Very bureaucratic in the larger, older divisions. Hard to break out of your job description and gain recognition when there are older, tenured personnel who are content and afraid of losing their positions.

Advice to Senior Management

One size fits all doesn't work, please make the effort to understand and recognize individuals. The other thing is that tenure shouldn't be rewarded over talent, performance, and initiative, especially in this economic environment.

Pros

money, great therapies ,benefits, customers, team, blah

Cons

no loyalty to productive employees , you are just a pin on the map

Advice to Senior Management

Get your act together on retaining employees that have demonstrated success after 10 years before you RIF their careers

Pros

Building a product that has a direct health benefit to the customer. The helpfulness of the other associates and the care of the delicate product through the entire production floor.

Cons

The supervisors lack management skills necessary to be professional toward the associates. They may have a degree, but they lacked the people skills to interact with a professional behavior with subordinates. Also, the high quotas that led to vendor parts shortages. The passing of questionable product by engineers that didn't want a black mark on their reports to upper management. Quantity was pushed rather than quality toward the end of my eight year employment at Medtronic. I was saddened by Medtronics lack of care for quality for a product that was to be implanted into a human being that would depend upon it to continue living.

Advice to Senior Management

Unfortunately, the push for quantity over quality came from upper management at Medtronic and the supervisors and associates were simply left with the answer of do it, pass it, or you're gone. In that type of work environment, at least at the CRDM facility in Tempe, AZ. there really wasn't a good solution.

Pros

GREAT benefits, pleasant environment, helping people who need it

Cons

silly games and prizes, I'm a professional and expect to be treated as such.

Advice to Senior Management

treat me like an adult

Pros

it use to be good company to work for...

Cons

-Management is clueless
-Progress only if you know people
-Hardwork is not the way to move up in this org

Advice to Senior Management

Change the management..lol

Pros

Great History, Great Products, Great Reputation in the marketplace

Cons

Bean counters replaced the visionaries.. Sick corporate culture

Advice to Senior Management

I know you are completely satisfied with your smug opinions and are immune to advice..

Pros

Culture that values patients, puts honesty in decision making before numbers, has appreciation towards work-life balance and compensates reasonably for performance, although can refine the last one a bit better.

Cons

Lot of scope for adopting best practices across different divisions, long timers in the company have a distinctly different mind-set than new comers and middle managers, slightly risk averse. On going performance evaluation and feedback is lacking. Project timelines difficult to predict and adhere to.

Advice to Senior Management

Figure out other means to reduce cost other than layoffs. The argument of restructuring the work-force isn't sound enough especially if layoffs are announced without a plan of what the new talent is going to look like. Please communicate properly with Wall Street and do not over-promise. There is no need to over-promise especially when the entire sector is having difficulties. Just focus on performance and Wall Street will follow. Put employees before stock value.

Pros

Medtronic has great work culture with all the flexibility.

Cons

Recently with layoffs and IBM taking over teams are becoming more and more siloed.

Pros

Pros:

Get to work on latest technologies
Decent Pay
Good Training program
Good place to learn for recent grads
45 hour or less work weeks

Cons

Lots of competition (Hard to "shine" since there are so many hardworking people)
Long hours when needed
Frequent Layoffs (layoffs for the past few years, every year)

Advice to Senior Management

The constant layoffs is creating an atmosphere of fear and apprehension around the company. You never know when you are going to get let go