Pros
[My comments mostly apply to white-collar workers. I don't have much experience in the plant or warehouse.] Generally has a small-company feel. Some of the top managers will greet you by name when they see you in the hallway. Older employees will feel welcomed. The average age seems like 50+. Health insurance premiums are fully company-paid. Big company-paid 401k bonus (better than a company-paid match). Very dedicated to U.S. manufacturing. There's no chance that your job will get offshored. I very much appreciate this, not just as an employee, but as a U.S. citizen, consumer, and taxpayer (80% of the purchase price of most buses is funded by the U.S. government). More companies should have this policy and not be afraid to advertise it! Some positions can be pretty low-effort if you're decently competent. Certain managers are underworked and half-asleep, but this even applies to some regular positions. Big qualification, I know a lot of people who are working Saturdays, extra hours, extra effort, no lunches, so there are big differences between departments and positions. If you get lucky, you might fall into one of the easier ones. Nice gifts for all employees at the holidays. No hassles from the I.T. department (they are responsive, you're not forced to use Internet Explorer, iTunes isn't blocked, etc.) Not much bureaucracy.
Cons
#1 problem by far: work hours. You're stuck working either a 5am-2pm or 7am-4pm shift. No exceptions. Hope you like going to bed at 7:30pm. They are sticklers for being on time as well. Better hope you don't hit 2 extra traffic lights red one day. A former SVP used to loiter at the coffee machine near a main entryway around 7:00 to watch the employees coming in and note who was late. Lunches must be taken on time and ended on time, regardless of business conditions. Tell that customer on the phone that you can't help them, because it's lunch time and you're not allowed to postpone lunch 10 minutes for business needs. By the way, this is all for SALARIED employees, not hourly! I understand that some people (engineering, HR) do need to work the same hours as the first shift at the plant (5:00-1:30) so that is understandable. But most employees do not. The company is MASSIVELY, ridiculously old-fashioned, in every way. Rigid work hours, no telecommuting, no 9/80 or 4/10, no public transit reimbursement/incentive (ironically!), no casual fridays, no education reimbursement. If it's been invented in the past 25 years, they probably aren't doing it. Typewriters are still used occasionally. Memos (real memos that say memo on the top) are printed out and handed from employee to employee to initial, even though we're all at our computers all day with the email client open. You'll never get an automated meeting request through email, even though we use a full-featured mail and calendar server. No one who schedules a meeting knows how to use that function. Top management takes it as a source of pride that they don't know how to use their computers for other than the most basic tasks. Too bad their admins are no help, they have minimal computer knowledge too. If you're a "change agent" this isn't the place for you. Other than the generous health insurance, benefits are average. No vacation for the first year, vacation is given out in blocks at the start of the year, rather than earned as you go, and must be used within a year. The 401(k) has good funds but takes a long time to vest. Another person mentioned nepotism among management. This is true, and it isn't just the relatives of managers. There are MANY father/son, husband/wife, brothers, cousins working at Gillig. I can't believe that all of these relatives just happened to be the best candidates for the open positions. VERY FEW women in management. Poor communication. I think some of this is specific to my department, but I think a lot of it is due to company culture and the paper memo thing. They introduced a new model, probably the biggest addition to the product line in almost 10 years, but there was no announcement to employees. Even those of us who need to be kept abreast of changes and new features only overheard it from some employees who were in the know. Another example. Apparently, you can have a paid day off on your birthday, but no one told me that, even when my birthday was during my vacations and I took vacation days for it for several years. There is a surprising lack of managerial knowledge or competence among some people at the director and VP level. I'm thinking they were promoted from within (good) but were never trained on how to be a manager. Most companies send managerial candidates (even team leads and bottom-level supervisors) to training classes. Some current managers don't have managment skills they should have learned when they started in a supervisory role 10-20+ years ago. Moving up the ladder may be hard due to the size of the company and the small number of positions available. You might end up changing to a different department that you know little about because there was an opening at the next level there. This may explain some of the problems with managerial competence. The only typical review or employee feedback is once a year at raise time, and it's pretty much in one direction. There are no quarterly reviews, employee progress reports, 360 degree feedback, etc.
