National Instruments Reviews

Current Employee – been working at National Instruments

Pros – Good projects for those straight out of school
Laid-back atmosphere
C-level management is very competent and personable

Cons – Pay compression for engineering roles
Low pay
"Favorites" receive disproportional priase/quicker promotions for equivalent work compared to others. This is probably present in all companies but is blatantly obvious at NI.

Advice to Senior Management – Make pay more competitive with other local companies. The experience is great but the staff/senior level attrition will probably continue to increase if the compensation doesn't.

Current Employee – been working at National Instruments

Pros – They're flexible about personal time off and vacations.

Cons – They don't pay well and the workload is doubled.

Advice to Senior Management – Promote from within.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at National Instruments

Pros – Great company culture
Strong performance culture but also stable and safe employer
Very deeply ethical, honest, high standards management
Visionary, ethical, committed, brilliant founder, CEO and president - Dr. Truchard

Cons – Unpredictable, inconsistent compensation practices by relatively inexperienced HR department.

Advice to Senior Management – Look out for longer tenure folks who have lost their drive, are well paid (but feel uncompetitive relative to market) and end up being a performance inhibitors for the company.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at National Instruments

Pros – - Intelligent, fun co-workers
- Great training
- Long term goals
- Employees are treated with respect
- Ethical workplace
- Supportive
- Internally Transparent

Cons – - Great mentors, OK advisers
- Open-ended tasks but allows people to take initiative
- Company favorites, people, are quickly established

Advice to Senior Management – Stay up to date with people's goals and paths. Have one-on-one's with the people you supervise.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at National Instruments

Pros – Location, corporate culture, Dr T, benefits, growing, stable, interesting market

Cons – None, nothing, zero, nada, zip

Advice to Senior Management – Keep on doing it the 'NI Way'

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at National Instruments

Pros – Great company, very friendly people, always willing to lend a helping hand. The internship program is very stable and structured, and they are always given something to do. I really like the people I work with and everyone seems really friendly and willing to chat with you.

Cons – The only thing I could say is I wish the cubicles were cleaned weekly. They're not cleaned at all, you have to clean them yourself. (I know this is petty...)

Advice to Senior Management – I wish they would hire more people! I would love to work for them but there aren't many positions open.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at National Instruments

Pros – National Instruments is setup for career growth. They hire a lot of very talented, young engineers straight out of school, and have very good training programs. There are a lot of projects in development, so most everyone gets a chance to shine with some real design work.

Cons – There is a downside to having a lot of young engineers who need to be trained. As a senior engineer, you spend a lot of time mentoring younger people. And although most managers are very good, you can occasionally find yourself in a group with little new growth or opportunities. This can be a difficult situation - so no matter how good the company is overall, hope for a good group and manager.

Advice to Senior Management – Certainly keep up the good work. Middle managers need to keep an eye out for group managers who aren't seeking the best opportunities for their engineers, and correct the issue.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at National Instruments

Pros – Great training programs, good people. New engineers are usually given good projects and mentorship; its a great opportunity for those fresh out of school.

Cons – The pay is low and getting the right opportunity for fast career advancement is pretty much a crapshoot. Not the ideal environment for someone wanting to work really hard and rapidly advance their career.

Advice to Senior Management – Really need to work on retaining top talent at the senior and above level. Be more open to new ideas.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at National Instruments

Pros – The work environment is awesome

Cons – The compensation, pay raises, and bonuses doesn't compare to most other companies.

Advice to Senior Management – If you want to keep the top talent, NI will need to start compensating close to the competition

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at National Instruments

Pros – Besides vacation the employee benefits were the best of all my other options. The employee stock purchasing plan and 401k matching are also very good.
NI is a very conservative company which is good on one hand, because of the stability it affords the employees. During my time at NI I've been able to find different avenues for developing my talents and skills.

Cons – The ELP department is a great place for engineering majors to start a career especially if they have not yet established what exactly they want to do with their careers, however after some time you become over qualified for essentially a glorified support role.

Advice to Senior Management – During a down economy it is very wise to hire domain experts for pennies, but don't forget the hardworking employees within the company, they understand the company and evangelize the products more