Mentor Graphics Reviews

Pros

Working at Mentor has been great. My co workers are friendly and always willing to help. The job is flexible and the pay is good.

Cons

Nothing I really enjoy working here.

Pros

Great people, nice facilities, flexible work schedule

Cons

401k matching, benefits keep getting reduced, limited growth potential, use of older technologies

Pros

Great work culture. Lot of opportunities to learn and grow new skillsets

Cons

Getting promoted is challenging as the attrition rate is low

Pros

Great campus and cafe for lunches, the work life balance is great, and the technology you work on is interesting with a large breadth

Cons

Very adverse to change, a lot of the tools are dated and need to be overhauled, a lot of technical debt circles each team

Pros

good environment good environment

Cons

no career path no career path

Advice to Management

be more professional

Pros

• Decent pay • Good benefits • Strongly encouraged to watch the state of the industry

Cons

• Bonuses have a lot to do with internal politics. • In recent years, went from a stellar vacation policy to "unlimited", which, in practice, means "depends on your manager". Personally, I got a LOT fewer days. • Found it rough working for a hardware team that was in a division made of software teams. The costs of fabrication and testing make higher managers' eyes bulge out.

Advice to Management

As the semiconductor industry matures, taking care of your people will make ever more difference. Avoid missteps on this front.

Pros

Friendly people and flexible hours

Cons

There were no real cons

Pros

Nice campus (in Wilsonville, OR)

Cons

In the EDA industry, Mentor Graphics is last place, and has been for ~30 years. Thus, it is a natural dumping ground for managers from Synopsys and Cadence (the other two big players in the industry), which leads to a very manager-oriented, top-heavy organization with a lot of politics. Furthermore, there is a culture of suppression at Mentor Graphics, so don't expect to get promoted very fast. And unless you start... out as a manager, you will *not* get a chance to enter that track. All the junior managers are basically managing upwards; that is, you feel like you are doing a lot of work just so your manager can look good and can climb the corporate ladder. Because of this, down at the engineering level, no one wants to do any work (i.e. they only do the minimum required), so it's hard to get help or cooperation when needed. Lots of complaining and shirking of responsibilities instead of collaborating and getting things done. Don't expect to be a part of a healthy team here - it's every person for themselves.

Advice to Management

Start promoting from within. Let people feel like they have ownership and pride in their work and that it matters. There's a lot of dead weight in the management ranks, which probably needs to be culled by about 50%. In my 8 years working at Mentor Graphics (across two different business units), I never saw a manager get let go.