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Killer Stress - Principal Project Manager CH2M Employee Review

1.0
Nov 11, 2016
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Large company with potential to work on interesting projects. I am adding a sentence to get to the 20 word minimum.

Cons

At least in the office where I worked the local and regional management were duplicitous and deceitful creating high levels of stress because there was really no way to tell when they were lying to you. When bad things happened on projects, there was an amazing level of arrogance from management and corporate (in Denver) that led to counterproductive and expensive conflicts with big clients. Thus leading to both loss of profit on the botched work and loss of future work. The organization was very siloed so talent and skills was hard to share across business groups. The company is clueless and in (I believe deliberate) denial regarding how much time and effort successful business development efforts really take. They talk the talk about clients but they really don't understand what a client is and are therefore focused on project pursuit. A client calls you and gives you work. CH2M does not get that and therefore does not do (or fund) what it takes to develop and nurture a true client. Virtually all staff are classified as "salaried" employees. However, unless you are a senior manager with an overhead number you can charge your time to, you are in fact an hourly employee. If you do not have 80 hours of chargeable work to enter on your time sheet every two weeks, you must use your PTO to make up the difference. Given the non-liquidity of CH2M stock, giving all 401k match in company stock is a negative. There allegedly is a bonus program but it is not available to the people that do the actual work and deliver projects. The bonus system is gamed regularly by regional managers to pass out $$ to cronies. Plus bonuses are only available to mucky mucks who have friends in high places.

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CH2M Response
9y
Thanks for your response and we’re sorry your experience here was disappointing. We hope you’ll consider returning to CH2M one day.

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Pros

Great Salary and great staff.

Cons

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2.0
Aug 2, 2016
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Vision and mission, benefits, interesting projects, offices...

Cons

I66 Management is ridiculous. A PM who has absolutely no idea - he's not even an engineer - and a business manager who has been continuously described by the client as incompetent and useless. It weighs heavy on me to hear the client saying " is this really ch2m?"

313
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CH2M Response
9y
Thank you for bringing this to our attention. We will share this with the appropriate leaders. Also, please discuss any concerns you have with your manager. Thanks.
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