Sikorsky Reviews

Pros

Great technology and some ground breaking stuff. If you happen to be in the right place, it is very exciting.

Cons

Mid - senior management has started micro managing staff in light of lean times ahead. Their lack of self condifence translates into a lack of trust in subordiantes.

Advice to Senior Management

Management at Sikorsku should re-learn to turst their staff and lead them, not micor manage them,

Pros

Great employees, willing to try new things to improve the process

Cons

Management rarely gave any praise for a job well done.

Pros

Location, convenient to parkway, shopping around the plant

Cons

The dysfunctional atmosphere is toxic to the company.

Advice to Senior Management

Stop

Pros

interesting products - high tech
big name company with a lot of "street" credit
highly experienced & helpful line workers
usage of many different top of the line design programs

Cons

I started working here at about the same time as Sikorsky took over the facility from Schweizer Aircraft. At that time it was run as a small close knit community where people were actively working together to achieve a single goal. Some times we reached that goal, some times not. Usually when we didn't it was because of over optimistic promises made by upper level management. Over the last 5 years the work environment, policies & procedures have changed so rapidly that the employee's no longer know what the companies goal's for the location are. Or maybe they do, just are unwilling to accept them. As a result the employee's stopped working as a unit & started working with a CYA attitude. A combination of factors have lead to serious layoff's at this location.

Advice to Senior Management

Trust your employee's & foster teamwork. They are good, hardworking people. Slow down & include them in your thought process. To them it looks like you are in the process of shutting down this location. As long as they see it this way they will be preoccupied with CYA activities instead of looking to do whats best for the company. Keep expectations realistic. If you deliver the materials for a product that is supposed to take 9 months to complete 6 months late it will NOT be completed on schedule. Be honest with the customers. If you can't get the material until Sept for a product that takes 9 months to complete do not promise delivery in Dec. Compensate your employees equally at all locations. I understand it is more expensive to live in Stratford, CT then in Horseheads, NY but not $20,000/yr less. That is the average pay discrepancy between Stratford & Horseheads. Besides look at the work product of the individuals at this location. They are carrying significantly more responsibility then their counterparts at Stratford with similar experience.

Pros

Sikorsky is lead by an extremely strong, committed, and skilled management team. This is the best helicopter company on the planet.

Cons

Overall performance can be affected sometimes by one flawed decision or approach to a large development program or budgetary decision by USG.

Advice to Senior Management

Continue to provide industry leadership in the area of innovation, design, production, and product support. Continue to cultivate a culture of performance management.

Pros

Good Pay
Good Benefits
Large Corporation amenities: decent cafeteria, also recently got a brand new gym (with trainers), fitness classes offered, bank, etc.
Interesting work
Laid back environment/friendly people
Facilities/labs/simulators
Smart employees

Cons

Location (although inevitable in aviation industry)

Pros

Very stable product sales (military); a few pockets of brilliant, highly skilled people; above average pay in my opinion; definitely a team oriented environment

Cons

Stifiling bureaucracy; forms and authorization are required for nearly everything... and if you don't use the standard form filled out correctly in its entirety, good luck getting the task accomplished; quarter end profitability trumps sanity and common sense

Advice to Senior Management

My advice to management? If you're competent enough to be a senior leader at UTC, leave. You could probably get a comparable job working less than 70 hours per week elsewhere

Pros

Many foreword thinker. all of the maintenance guys seem to pull together to get a task done with good quality.

Cons

put a lot of time and money into a new concept to turn around and discard it.

Advice to Senior Management

Be more upfront with all associates as to the direction the company is heading.

Pros

If u work hard, u will go far! It is important to work high visibility programs though.

Cons

Once u reach a certain level, there is nowhere else to go

Advice to Senior Management

Listen to your employees!

Pros

Learning how helicopters are made is awesome, who would not want to do this?!

Cons

I did not get much help with relocation and did not have help with transportation