What is the hiring process like at TSMC?

- Pay is good. TSMC states their target pay is in the 75th percentile range, which based on my research for competing companies like Intel and Samsung, I would believe. Night shift workers or "swing shift" for engineering positions will provide a pay differential of 16%, which adds up especially with overtime. - Plenty of overtime opportunity for those who want it. If you felt like it, you could easily do 50+ hours every week. For hourly positions like technician ones, this adds up to quite a bit of money and could be considered a "pro". However for engineering positions that are salaried, and for those with time-sensitive personal needs like parenting, you are negatively affected by this overtime culture. Read more about this in my cons though. - Benefits are solid. There's employee stock options, 401k, health coverage, dental coverage, vision coverage, and more. It has been significant for my personal finances to have these even disregarding the higher pay compared to other similar positions. - Coworkers are generally good people, including the Taiwanese. I have experience interacting with people from nearly every department, and I have generally had positive experiences. There are the inevitable bad eggs, but most people are decently personable and willing to work with you as needed. - The job allows for lots of creative liberty with finding and implementing solutions to problems. If you can get around the "big company bureaucracy" and the slowness that ensues, possibilities for learning about semiconductors and manufacturing are nearly limitless. I find this to be very fun and personally rewarding, however you need to be the type of person to read further into things to see it and appreciate it, as the job can be tedious.

- Company culture. The culture of TSMC is essentially to be a slave to TSMC. Although TSMC has more money than one can possibly imagine, they somehow lack the ability to support their workers' needs and will blame people for not meeting their high expectations. - Time management. This is the main con of this job. For technicians, there are only four available shifts, which I'll refer to here as "A, B, C, and D shift". A and B are front end of the week, day and night, and C and D are back end of the week, day and night. All four are 12 hour shifts, either 6am-6pm or 6pm-6am, with a 3-4-4-3 schedule of days worked and days off. However, you are often expected to stay late by up to 30 minutes to hand over to the next shift, which can be quite egregious especially if you're a night shift worker with long commute. Also, to keep pay similar between workers, day and night shift are to be switched every 6 months. I have seen some managers who do this and others who don't, but for those who do not want to work nights, this job is NOT it. - Overtime is practically a requirement. Currently as of October 2024, there is a shortage of technicians. This company has a policy that requires its workers to delegate somebody to cover their shifts if they take time off, and this is especially true in the case there's only one worker on a shift, which happens to me frequently. This is compounded by my next point. - Hiring is slower than I ever imagined possible. The hiring process took me 3 months due to how slow the communication was. TSMC relies on external recruitment companies to do all of their hiring, which adds an extra and unneeded layer of complication. Turnover is quite high, and my department has been short for technicians for multiple months, and yet has not hired on any new ones. I imagine this issue will become far worse when many of the work visas expire in late 2024 and early 2025, as some of the essential Taiwanese assignees will be forced to return home with time. - Language Barrier. What feels like roughly half of the workers are Taiwanese natives. Some of them speak excellent English, yet others can barely speak English, which hampers communication to a large degree especially given the context of complex semiconductor manufacturing. That being said, it doesn't make the Taiwanese bad people, and most I have met have been a pleasure to work alongside. They are definitely trying very hard and should be commended for learning about as foreign of a language as possible for native Mandarin speakers. TSMC also mandates some English testing for the Taiwanese "assignees" to keep English skills to certain standards, and I believe this issue of the language barrier will eventually become a non-issue due to the company's efforts. - Management is extremely hands off. Although I prefer a less micro-managed approach, I think at least once a week should be a minimum to speak with your workers, and yet I have gone over a month without discussing my work with my manager on multiple occasions. Although there are consistent daily handovers for what is being worked on, not aligning goals with managers and other coworkers causes folks to stumble over each other at times, creating inefficiencies.

You’ll be paid decently if you’re new to the semiconductor industry, and can deal with the constant soul sucking.

There is nothing positive about working for this company. The HR team is incompetent on all fronts. Any good HR employees that worked here saw the writing on the wall and jumped ship. Be careful during the hiring process because they will carefully word their vacation policy and sick time policy. They like to send out monthly newsletters showcasing them going to Top Golf, Scottsdale, and other places with no real purpose(Makes you wonder how often it was on company time). After awhile you start to wonder what they actually do all day, because it’s often doubtful to be “work”. Well, aside from constantly having to do damage control because they fail their employees constantly. They used to do Q and A discussions that got so out of hand that they limited interactions and questions before getting rid of the process all together. Defaulting to “mass” emails sent with pre-recorded announcements and poorly put together FAQs, but they didn’t usually make it to every employee so hope that a coworker can send it to you. Otherwise, they would tell managers to relay to teams because they didn’t want to deal with backlash. Their whole “culture” if you can call it that is we’re all one team so if you make a mistake, everyone on that team will blame you for making them look bad then will proceed to bully or isolate you. It’s encouraged to “highlight” co-worker’s mistakes, and the more you “highlight”, the better you will look. You will likely see verbal abuse in one of the countless (I do mean countless) Teams group chats you’re in even with higher level management in those chats. Expect your training to be poor, with training documents only just being put together in the past year, by employees new to the industry who also don’t fully understand what they’re doing. There’s a lot of half-baked, partially done training projects that eventually get abandoned until the next massive push for new, different SOPs. If you stay long enough to be a trainer, you are expected to reach your quota while also training multiple new people and being responsible for their mistakes even if it’s a process you haven’t touched in literal months with zero time given to get re-familiar with the process again. This happens a lot because you will likely be bounced from wildly different processes or even sent out to help with construction babysitting because even the construction workers despise being on site. The cliques are rampant in both the Taiwanese and American workers. Expect gossip and rumors to fly constantly, and that if your manager hears about it, they might ask you about it or just further spread the gossip. If a manager has a problem with you, expect it to go through at least 3-5 others before it reaches you. Every month you get to see a grading system, but this heavily weighed on manager and supervisor personal opinion, and if it’s a bonus month, they might give you a better grade or worse, depending on how desperate they are to keep you from quitting and how much they dislike you. Not necessarily based off your actual work for each period. Their reputation as an employer is so abysmal that you’ll find multiple job postings with the same description and location with and without TSMC’s name attached to it. In Taiwan, they like to hire young to build loyal long term employees. They are trying to do something similar by camping out high school job fairs, hiring freshly graduated people then acting surprised that they aren’t getting the same loyalty they would in Taiwan. This also means it’s a gamble on if you’ll get a hard worker or a loud, useless worker who trashes the company to anyone and everyone while expecting their trainer to pick up the slack or even get the trainer’s own wages/bonuses/compensation hurt. Also if you’re over the age of 35, they will likely not hire you. They want employees they can get a lot of years out of, so best to look elsewhere. They will ask very pointed questions in the interview, alluding to longer job history and asking if you “really want to leave such a long tenure.” Training has never been a priority. They sent people to “train” in Taiwan for a year, and when dealing with the constant frustration from people about the lack of training material or guidance, a particular manager stated “TSMC wasn’t ready to bring you here.” Fully admitting that this company puts on a front that they are thriving, they know what they’re doing, but you ask any managers, they will either try and dodge the question or blame someone else. Be prepared to lock your cellphone away and go through metal detectors. You will get a company phone, so if you have a family emergency, they can contact you, but if you’re seen using the phone regardless of if it’s family related, your work performance WILL suffer. If you have any choice, don’t work here. The pay they dangle does not outweigh the mental and physical stress (which your insurance and “mental health” benefits are subpar so don’t expect that to help you recover.)

You get to work for a leading tech company and on the latest technology

My experience at TSMC Arizona has been challenging, with issues of discrimination amongst engineers, a severe workload, and a lack of recognition. TSMC presents itself as a leader in technology, but there are systemic problems that need addressing. There is an undeniable bias in hiring and treatment, favoring Taiwanese locals and assignees over American employees. This bias is not subtle; it's supported by leadership, and evident throughout the departments, creating a sense of inferiority among American staff. Additionally, instead of hiring local employees to help severely understaffed teams, they continue to bring over Taiwanese assignees who do not even work in the department they are being brought into. My department has several openings for engineers and managers, but instead of hiring Americans they have brought more Taiwan assignees over. The work environment has an unsustainable work-life balance and an overwhelming workload. Employees are expected to put in long hours, sacrificing personal time and well-being for the sake of meeting “targets” our directors set. Leaders focus just on results and undermines morale. Despite delivering on objectives, employees are routinely criticized for minor shortcomings, and successes go unrecognized. There is a strong culture of “highlighting”, where during cross departmental meetings employees who are struggling or make mistakes, are highlighted to leadership. It is extremely toxic and the threat of being highlighted is constantly used throughout our section. While the pay at TSMC Arizona can be competitive, it comes at a price. High salaries can trap employees in a cycle where they feel they must choose between financial security and a decent work-life balance/mental heath. As an employee you either continue sacrificing well-being for the sake of a paycheck, or prioritize yourself and seek a healthier workplace elsewhere. The high amount of employees leaving speak for themselves - employees are even leaving without having secured a new job.

TSMC looks good on a resume

My contract (through TSMC) was originally 6 months. Instead of hiring me on Full time, they have tacked on 3 90 day extensions, with a revolving door of expectations. They always change the goal at the last minute, and fail to communicate these changes until you find out that you are being extended. They do not allow personal phones past any of the security gates, and are extremely strict regarding anything they do. This includes sharing of basic information you need to do your job. Management is a joke, the allegations in the clase action going on are real. The cleanroom is hot as heck, and kept humid. They have two single drinking fountains that serve all 4 floors of the cleanroom. OSHA anyone? Prepare to only do PMs and make sure you are hydrated enough to spend 15 hours of your 13 hour shift in the cleanroom. Exposure to toxic chemicals and gasses is one open chamber and breath away, as PAPR and other proper PPE usage is rare. The number of people who have died on site or been injured here is abnormally high for this industry. Money, PM completion, and daily photos of trash you pick up in your module all come before safety. This company will not work with you when it matters, image and reputations are at the forefront of this political environment. Management has no effin clue on how to work in America.

- Pay is good. TSMC states their target pay is in the 75th percentile range, which based on my research for competing companies like Intel and Samsung, I would believe. Night shift workers or "swing shift" for engineering positions will provide a pay differential of 16%, which adds up especially with overtime. - Plenty of overtime opportunity for those who want it. If you felt like it, you could easily do 50+ hours every week. For hourly positions like technician ones, this adds up to quite a bit of money and could be considered a "pro". However for engineering positions that are salaried, and for those with time-sensitive personal needs like parenting, you are negatively affected by this overtime culture. Read more about this in my cons though. - Benefits are solid. There's employee stock options, 401k, health coverage, dental coverage, vision coverage, and more. It has been significant for my personal finances to have these even disregarding the higher pay compared to other similar positions. - Coworkers are generally good people, including the Taiwanese. I have experience interacting with people from nearly every department, and I have generally had positive experiences. There are the inevitable bad eggs, but most people are decently personable and willing to work with you as needed. - The job allows for lots of creative liberty with finding and implementing solutions to problems. If you can get around the "big company bureaucracy" and the slowness that ensues, possibilities for learning about semiconductors and manufacturing are nearly limitless. I find this to be very fun and personally rewarding, however you need to be the type of person to read further into things to see it and appreciate it, as the job can be tedious.

- Company culture. The culture of TSMC is essentially to be a slave to TSMC. Although TSMC has more money than one can possibly imagine, they somehow lack the ability to support their workers' needs and will blame people for not meeting their high expectations. - Time management. This is the main con of this job. For technicians, there are only four available shifts, which I'll refer to here as "A, B, C, and D shift". A and B are front end of the week, day and night, and C and D are back end of the week, day and night. All four are 12 hour shifts, either 6am-6pm or 6pm-6am, with a 3-4-4-3 schedule of days worked and days off. However, you are often expected to stay late by up to 30 minutes to hand over to the next shift, which can be quite egregious especially if you're a night shift worker with long commute. Also, to keep pay similar between workers, day and night shift are to be switched every 6 months. I have seen some managers who do this and others who don't, but for those who do not want to work nights, this job is NOT it. - Overtime is practically a requirement. Currently as of October 2024, there is a shortage of technicians. This company has a policy that requires its workers to delegate somebody to cover their shifts if they take time off, and this is especially true in the case there's only one worker on a shift, which happens to me frequently. This is compounded by my next point. - Hiring is slower than I ever imagined possible. The hiring process took me 3 months due to how slow the communication was. TSMC relies on external recruitment companies to do all of their hiring, which adds an extra and unneeded layer of complication. Turnover is quite high, and my department has been short for technicians for multiple months, and yet has not hired on any new ones. I imagine this issue will become far worse when many of the work visas expire in late 2024 and early 2025, as some of the essential Taiwanese assignees will be forced to return home with time. - Language Barrier. What feels like roughly half of the workers are Taiwanese natives. Some of them speak excellent English, yet others can barely speak English, which hampers communication to a large degree especially given the context of complex semiconductor manufacturing. That being said, it doesn't make the Taiwanese bad people, and most I have met have been a pleasure to work alongside. They are definitely trying very hard and should be commended for learning about as foreign of a language as possible for native Mandarin speakers. TSMC also mandates some English testing for the Taiwanese "assignees" to keep English skills to certain standards, and I believe this issue of the language barrier will eventually become a non-issue due to the company's efforts. - Management is extremely hands off. Although I prefer a less micro-managed approach, I think at least once a week should be a minimum to speak with your workers, and yet I have gone over a month without discussing my work with my manager on multiple occasions. Although there are consistent daily handovers for what is being worked on, not aligning goals with managers and other coworkers causes folks to stumble over each other at times, creating inefficiencies.

-Stable job/company -50-75 percentile in compensation for this type of engineering role (slightly above average) -will sponsor visa -In my opinion, this is a political FAB so you will never have to face the same level of pressure of wafer throughput that mass production FAB's do in Taiwan and the tech will always be about at least 1-2yrs behind what Taiwan has (this makes life much easier as an engineer).

-every imaginable aspect of this job is a con except that the advanced tech is interesting and the job requirement puts you under immense pressure to improve as an engineer -if you don't get priced in well initially management/HR will not adjust your salary to be comparable to your peers regardless of performance -everyone leaves around 1~3yrs who does not require visa sponsorship leaving every department is understaffed and undertrained -you should not working here if you are a US citizen or have a green card already -they previously fired all US directors so you will never become a manager/director unless you are a fluent mandarin speaker -they cut bonuses at every opportunity even when making money hand over fist -big tech company without big tech pay or flexibility (good luck talking to your family, friends, etc when your phone is kept in a locker and you get worked like a dog) -huge portion of salary is based on performance rating for Taiwanese employees which creates a imbalanced and unfair dynamic for employees with the same job when it comes to effort and work load -terrible office politics with management who would "rather give budget for team dinner than give better pay or bonuses" (yes the head of HR literally said this to us in a retention related meeting for local hires XD) -all of the high salaries reported are from retention bonuses given to US hires who trained in Taiwan over 1yr ago and will not be given to anyone hired after (there are essentially 3 different compensation packages for people with the same job title are yours will be the lowest possible as a new hire) -you will not have any time or energy for anything but work -As a US hire you will likely never be given any opportunity to do critical work (you will be hired to fill quota so TSMC can say they made more jobs for the US and your main objective will be reduce the work load of your Taiwanese counterparts)