Schlumberger Reviews

I worked at Schlumberger

Pros – They respect people and create a positive working environement. Work is interesting and you can get a lot of responsibility early on.

Cons – Politics and lack of transparency in HR is very bad. Transfers/promotions is a very convoluted and opaque process. Most people don't get the transfer they want unless they threaten to quit.

Advice to Senior Management – More transparency. You have to help people see their personal development is valued or they will not stay and there will continue to be high turnover. Also do a better job of making sure people have the qualifications for the position that they hold.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at Schlumberger

Pros – World Wide Organization - vast opportunities if in right spot at right time

Cons – inexperieanced Engineer's become managers and forget where they come from - they get self centered and ignorant.

Advice to Senior Management – don't forget the 'non' Engineer's whom have given blood, sweat and tears....

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

I worked at Schlumberger

Pros – Great benifits, competitive pay, training if you are liked. If you are top in your class, it does not matter what in, you will sucede, others will suffer.

Cons – Management does not have a clue about there employees capibilities.
They do much favoritisim. Management does not care to get to know the employees.
The first in the industry to cut jobs and use favortisim in downturns. They will terminate without cause often for silly rules like no steeltoes in a meeting etc. Lots of rules that are sometimes not well spelled out. They want criticism and safety issues brought up but only from the ones they favor, others will be ignored.
They will hire over experienced industry personel by incompetent (inexperienced-non degreed)new hires.
Philosophy is a young force looks productive. Looks are everything to them.
No transfer abilities easily whithin, even though they will claim the opposite.

Advice to Senior Management – Learn to get to know your employees. Quit being so arragant. Quit listining to employees with no experience who kiss up for recognition. Look at the experienced employees background and the benifits you could have with your clients. I was always told in the industry about the pompous arragance of this company predominantly from there clients. Many clients refuse to use them just because of this. Managers need to quit being so ignorant, unreasonable and judgemental.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at Schlumberger

Pros – Great benefits package, great 401k plan, lots of training, great place to start career. It is really a Your Mileage May Vary company; also the quality of work life depends on how your management leads your business segment.

Cons – There is too much internal politics.
Promotions and choice assignments are given out on a favoritism scale.
An unreasonable amount of work hours put in, the managers expect employees to live, breathe, and eat Blue. But not pay for quality work.

Advice to Senior Management – It is common sense in the operations side of the house is that if you want the best people to work for you, then you have to pay the best salaries. Majority of field hands did not come to the oil industry for the dental plan...

I have been working at Schlumberger

Pros – - Above Average Pay
- Great Global Corporation
- Industry with a great future
- Great Benefits
- Global Opportunities

Cons – - Heavy Internal Politics
- All sales done by VPs
- Managers don't take time to get to your know strengths, weaknesses and interests. In fact they don't have a clue what you know or don't know.
- You may be asked to travel 40+ hours to reach a client destination and be expected to work a full day as soon as you arrive (without a chance to sleep).
- When having a project abroad it would not be unusual for you to have to spend 72+ hours awake, unless you are lucky enough to sleep in the plane.
- Company is full of bureaucratic processes that invade your own privacy. For example you can't use your mobile phone in your car (even if you have a car kit built into it)...and not even when going to work or return to your home from work. Lots more restrictions like that.
- Company is completely different in the USA than in Europe and Asia. In USA you can have a good work life balance, but if you get assigned to Europe you could end up being away from your family (in AFRICA!) for 6 months without a chance to see your babies and wife. In Asia the leadership treats employees really bad (maybe because he can find replacements easily) so beware.

Advice to Senior Management – I think its clear from the above comments; and given the high turnaround that we have seen in the last few years they should know that something is wrong.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at Schlumberger

Pros – I love the responsibility that I have in the field. Schlumberger lets me take responsibility and make my own decisions. Love managing my crew. I would have never had the management duties this early in any other job!

Cons – Ok...so I work a lot which is ok because I love it. I can see how some people could get burnt out. This is a great job for the right person. If you aren't right for the job I can see how you could hate it.

Advice to Senior Management – Talk to you FEs to make sure that they aren't getting burnt out. If they are...give them some time off.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at Schlumberger

Pros – 1. Smart people
2. Good management (mostly)
3. Proper technology focus
4. Diversity
5. Benefits

Cons – 1. Possibility of getting locked down in one area
2. Need to move in order for propmotion (and its impact on family)
3. Tecnical ladder definition could be better

Advice to Senior Management – 1. Ensure that the people understand the strategy (why are doing this?) - especially true at segment level
2. Arrange 360 feedback for senior management
3. Strategy for longer term : communicate

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

I worked at Schlumberger

Pros – 1. Extremely well chalked out training program which can help to build great competencies.
2. High mobility on the ob so within two years (during training) you get to travel al lot and after acquiring experience many other international opportunities open up

Cons – 1. Very restricted growth. You do acquire knowledge and skills but in a very specific area so moving to some other speciality after a while becomes difficult.
2. As it goes with service companies, you do have to take crap from the client.

Advice to Senior Management – Not sure why service companies are so ruthless at cutting down man-power during the downturn while E&P companies are not much. If this could be avoided, it'll be great.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at Schlumberger

Pros – Strong and truly International work culture

Cons – No real innovation
To much emphasis on external collaboration vs organic growth

Advice to Senior Management – Develop strong core internal expertise and stop relying on excessove collaborations for building core technologies

I have been working at Schlumberger

Pros – Its a great place to work if you solely focus on getting yourself ahead and looking good to your superiors.

Cons – Engineers do not make the best managers, sales people or marketing folks. The idea that a limber engineer can succeed in any role you drop them is the prevailing attitude. The concept of ability that cannot be taught is foreign in this place. If you read enough TBTs and scour InTouch, you can rule the world.

Advice to Senior Management – Hire people that have an aptitude at what you are hiring them to do, not people that have fancy letters behind their names. You need more entrepreneurial spirit in the company, which means you need to restructure compensation to foster that spirit.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend