TRW Automotive Reviews

I have been working at TRW Automotive

Pros – - A lot of product innovation ,market is quickly changing.
- Friendly atmosphere
- A lot of freedom to get the job done

Cons – - Capital expenditure kept to a minimum. Don't forget, the company is owned by a private equity firm ...
- Very old infrastructure, limited access to resources, packed offices, everything looks so cheap
- Benefits way below average, health cost incredibly high to workers.
- Don't expect the lower management to help you plan your career, they are job is first to reduce the costs.
- The job is disorganized.

Advice to Senior Management – - Stand up, "Reducing the costs" cannot be the one and only company driver. Have the courage to say stop: we don't need 4 signatures for any travel approval or for any penny we spent on capital investment! This is a waste of your time and ultimately can cost more to the company.
- Even for product development, don't try to "reduce the costs" for any single program independently, guys, it is time to look at the global picture, you are upsetting the customers!

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at TRW Automotive

Pros – Paycheck, somewhat secure, lots of work to be done. Many interesting development programs.

Cons – Management is cleaning up at the top, profits not being shared with people doing the work. Getting more red tape, more bureaucracy for task completion. Benefits reduced, not justified with the profits being made. Not enough key resources for the booked business. Need more engineers less program management.

Capital equipment is squeezed to the point where engineering equipment and facility is old and not keeping up with industry. Physical environment is substandard.

Advice to Senior Management – People are your greatest resource start treating them that way. It used to be a people friendly place to work.

I worked at TRW Automotive

Pros – Leader in the Braking and OSS technology.

Cons – Middle management basically sucks. Very limited internal recognition and growth. They will try to hire you back after you are dissatisfied and has left the company.

I worked at TRW Automotive

Pros – Good opportunities to learn new IT skills. Good people to work with. Relatively flexible with time off. On-call duties weren't too rough (not a lot of out-of-hours pages to handle). 401k match. Benefits aren't (weren't) too bad.

Cons – Pay was substantially less than what the market was paying for someone with my skills and experience. Raises and bonuses were generally offensively low. HR department is effectively in charge of IT. No respect for ability from manager.

Advice to Senior Management – Stop trying to solve all your "problems" in secret. Trust your staff to do what you hired them to do and stop micromanaging them and questioning their every decision. Not every decision needs to be discussed in excruciating detail in front of a committee of people.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

I worked at TRW Automotive

Pros – Good and solid products with nice compromise between quality and price.
Quite good co-operation between US and EU and almost the same standards.
Good solutions at TRW UK taken from Lucas.
You can learn lot about HW/SW validation.
Nice EMI/EMC lab.
Nice atmosphere (friendly staff).
Friendly high level management.

Cons – - Automotive is very unstable branch
- Low cost, low cost and low cost...
- Political decisions at the top of managament (CMC India outsourcing, validation only in UK, almost empty tech center in China (China staff have problems to speak English. They wait for global finance domination and Chinese as a standard/native language in worldwide business. Prepare for that and start learning).
- TRW spend a lot of money unwisely (i.e. compare expenses during 2007 vs 2009). During the economical down they cut almost everything.
- Poor business decisions during past (IT helpdesk in India). They also move more competences/tasks to external outsourcing companies like CMC India (poor comunication and problems with understanding the task).
- High level management very often do not get a feedback about REAL situation from the low level managers (I mean projects, situation overseas and projects)
- Needless endless and boring competition about the leadership/importance (projects) between TRW Germany and TRW US
- Poor R&D level (they do not use widely the latest EMC/EMI CAD/CAE software solutions that minimize HW issues during validation)
- No challenging taks for engineer. Mostly paperwork and meetings (there are better places to use and gain your skills).
- Bureaucracy with not efficient communication (too much focus on processes, meetings, mail communication etc.)
- Mass layoffs from time to time ("You are not an so important!"). Anyway before lay offs some people at TRW "simulated" real work, so it was a good move to motivate staff again.

Advice to Senior Management – Threat employee more seriously. Company can survive, but putting all business in China in the future to significantly reduce the cost means that US and UE will be situated in China pocket.

I worked at TRW Automotive

Pros – Global Company...travel experience...etc are some of what the company offered. There are times when promotions internally are posted and you can move up.

Cons – Standard pay raises, smaller bonuses to lower pay grade employees, high co-ins out of pockets expenses. No more pension.

Advice to Senior Management – Paying attention to what the employees have to offer and not always looking on the outside for development. Higher profit sharing to the people that do the work.

I worked at TRW Automotive

Pros – Entry level still given opportunity to interact with customers
Friendly atmosphere
Professional

Cons – Somewhat unorganized
Lack of lean production

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at TRW Automotive

Pros – People here are friend and very willing to help.
Smart people are in surplus here.
Good benefits at full hire.
Management is helpful and gives great direction and encouragement.

Cons – Automotive industry is volatile, when GM/Ford/Chrysler are doing well, TRW does well.
There isn't much to do locally here in Livonia.

Advice to Senior Management – Keep doing what you are doing, encouragement and praise for good work is just as important as pointing out areas where improvement is needed. Keep doing what you are doing.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

I worked at TRW Automotive

Pros – my role required lots of traveling which was great in terms of personal exposure, to work with and meet different people and cultures.
Compensation did consider the amount of time that was being put into traveling

Cons – little consideration was given to personal time, this seems to be changing now - on the positive side.
Very little compensation increase.

Advice to Senior Management – better organisation of activities and interaction with internal clients

I have been working at TRW Automotive

Pros – Nice people to work with, a lot of knowledgeable people at TRW and strong company business coming their way soon

Cons – Hard to move up the ladder, seems there is a little communication issues between high management and regular employees sometimes