Novellus Reviews

Pros

Well I must say that the pay is decent although management is currently doing everything they can think of to take that away as well. Soon there will be no reason whatsoever to work here.

Cons

It always comes down to the people, doesn't it? NVLS has a reputation for only promoting employees who are blatant, shameless suck-ups or who are part of the good-ol-boy club or the "Inner Circle". Unless you enjoy having your head up your boss' ass, you can pretty much forget promotions and raises. Field Service folks recently had their pay reduced by almost 500 bucks a month. Ouch.

Advice to Senior Management

It would seem like common sense to ensure that your employees who interact with your number one customer on a daily basis are well taken care of and that morale is at least pretty good, but Rick Hill and gang dont see it that way...obviously. If this doesn't change ASAP your experienced FSE's will be gone.

Pros

Good stock option plan in the late 1990's

Accountablity among all levels. If you designed it, you were reponsible for making it work. (what a concept)

Some departments run by exceptionally qualified people.

A good EIT program for new engineers. Exposes new engineers to process. field service, project management, and operations.

Cons

Pay is somewhat lower than companies of similar size

Lots of croynism in upper management. Unless you were hired in the "in" crowd, the chances of advancing beyond middle management is nil.

Upper management manages by intimindation.

CEO is a bit of a megalomanic.

Advice to Senior Management

Stop yelling and start respecting your line engineers. If an employee is doing an exceptional job, reward them - don't merely give them more work to do.

Pros

Good exposure to advanced technology. Possible to advance quickly in career if you are smart. A lot of smart people to work with.

Cons

Poor communication from management on goals. Micromanaging culture. Frantic, chaotic method of troubleshooting and problem solving with poor documentation of what was done to fix the problem.

Advice to Senior Management

Think for the company not just your group. Communicate company goals clearly to the people below clearly.

Pros

The benefits package was the best I have ever heard of, but it has become less valuable in recent years.

Cons

Management was terrible. Senior management kept changing places, not allowing an executive to understand the problems in his division and leaving the directors free to play political games and fight with each other instead of doing useful work.

Advice to Senior Management

You need to get control of your middle level management, and support your lower level managers in learning to be effective, rather than just micromanaging.

Pros

Good work envirnoment.. Some people with passion and good sense.
Chance to work in the most advanced industry.. Global exposure

Cons

Very old fashioned ,, unrealistic management.. poor planning..poor employee effort recognition..
favoritism to a great extent..Poor hr policies.. review system is pathetic

Advice to Senior Management

Advice... start accepting the truth and be adaptive .. Have more interaction and feedback session with the employees. Its cos of them that the company is going somewhere...

Pros

Long term security ... if you make it through the lay-offs.

Cons

No career development or mentoring from management.

Advice to Senior Management

Provide leadership, vision, and realize that your success depends directly on the success of the people below you.

Pros

Pays rent. People need jobs in this economy. Believe it or not, there are a few honest people working there with intergrity. A few. Short drive. Green to blue coming?

Cons

Horrible management. Forced to use up all your paid time off, actually more PTO in a quarter than you earn all year. and PTO is used for sick days. Pay. CEO is only worried about selling the company so that he can retire with a lump sum. Backstabbers, can't trust anyone. Everyone is out for themselves. Management refuses to say no to a certain customer for anything. Healthcare cost just doubled, while benifit and coverage declined. Not allowed to have a work life balance. Customers manage us more than our management does. Most decisions regarding personnel are based on whether they like the person, not based on their work performance. Promotions etc are based on if you are buddy buddy with management. Solar world still hiring?

Advice to Senior Management

If most of the reviews say to fire a certain person, are the right?

Pros

Challenging environment
Problem Solving Skills
Relatively small company and one gets to know the full product life cycle
Opportunities to do whatever interests you the most

Cons

Low Pay
Cyclical Industry
Matured Technology
Low Employee Morale

Advice to Senior Management

Need to promote more people to boost morale.

Need to continue the above and beyond recognition program

Pros

Pays the rent, steady paycheck if you are a superior performer. Used to be exciting and rewarding 10 years ago. Lot's of cash to weather a downturn, understanding of the need to maintain a minimum infrastructure (including headcount) to prepare for future rebound.

Cons

Future is bleak. Semi is a commodity-based business now. Potential for industry growth is minimal. We are all "normalizing" to the payscale of the global semi workforce, which means DOWN. (Hey, just read the review from the guy in Hanoi, happy to get $400/mo.) Once you become skilled in semi, it is uncertain if you can transition into other fields easily, hence becoming pigeon-holed. The company is positioning itself for acquisition or merger. Like Rick Hill says every quarter, "Now we need to work EVEN HARDER." Well that is the future you have to look forward to. As stated earlier, the pay is normalizing to the global workforce, so say goodbye to all the high-tech perks from the late 90's: stock options, stock purchase plan, elimination of many other benefit programs. There is essentially no comeraderie whatsoever, unlike 10 years ago. Now there is a panicky, dog-eat-dog mentality, everyone tying to show how they are the "smartest man in the room", and how their peers are incompetents.
To sum it all up, you get to look forward to increased competition (among companies and workers) , higher stress, less job security, lower pay, lesser benefits, recognition and bonuses. Enjoy.........

Advice to Senior Management

I have lost interest in giving advice to managers because I have lost all hope of vestment in the future of this company. So in essence, I do not care what management does. But I cannot fault the way Rick is running things, I can see from his perspective what goals need to be met. (listening to conference calls and quarterly meetings) That is, if the goal is acquisition or merger, then he is doing the right things.

Pros

To get your feet wet in the Tech business if you make it past certain gauntlets of management.

Cons

Hard to take time off when needed but forced to take it when it pleases them, management tends to be very cliquish if you don't shoot or eat or party with them you are held to a different standard to others.
 Very slow raises in good times but Novellus is quick to take away in huge chunks when times are tough from car allowance removals to Insurance increases and so on, your pay can go down easily by a a fourth one year to the next.
Very disrespectful of personal time, after getting off work after a long night management thinks nothing of calling you over for a meeting which usually could have been handled by Email.

Advice to Senior Management

Watch your local managers a much closer, ask yourself are they really being professional or is there nepotism in the works.
 Learn to sacrifice when training is really needed, you would have much better employees if you spent more quality time with your employees with more hands on training outside of the customers eyes.
 Allow people to move ahead outside of management not everyone wants to be part of the collective, some of us have lives separate from work such as church, sports,family and friends, we like to plan outside of work.
 Allow a rating system that honestly asks the employees what they think of management, you awful critical of us when it comes time to review, try seeing for a change what we think of you.