Baker Hughes Reviews

Current Employee – been working at Baker Hughes

Pros – The company is so diverse that there is no reason for anyone to ever be bored in their job, new challenges are always availible and in general most people you work with are excellent at there jobs, and will always be on hand to help. In general the company favours self-starters, and allows a lot of leeway in getting jobs done. Career advancement and opportunitys seem to come in cycles which provides stability for the most part, but also lots of dramatic changes ever few years at specific times. Upper management is approachable and fairly capable at helping you get things done, but the sheer size of the company almost ensures that you never deal with the same person twice, unless you have linked disciplines, or are working on complimentary projects. Company image is great with clients, and ensures that what you say is taken seriously with them.

Cons – Employee's with 10 -20years + make more money that some district managers, lots of guys with lots of experience, but they also tend to be slow to change, adverse to any new personnel coming in, and hold a lot of influence with the upper management team, and as such can roadblock your development because they've had the same job for years and don't want to move, which means you need to find a way around them, which is always resented. New Technologies not implimented quickly enough, and capable technical specialists are not always availible when required, and obviously aren't paid enough. The company needs to try harder to let younger employees develop in the company, rather being suffocated by the cynical, but experienced older personnel employeed above them.

Advice to Senior Management – Forget Rebranding the company's image - get some serious Business Development Managers in place to actual sell our services effectively

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Baker Hughes full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – In all fairness, normally pay is high and compensates demand and complexity of the organisation. Good career opportunities (especially abroad and/or Field). Clear policies. Very good internal systems and IT applications. Very global and multicultural.

Cons – Complex organisation. Impersonal. Appalling decision making (process takes so long the decision becomes obsolete and you have to start all over again, which is so frustrating). No recognition - it is not only about pay (which is okay but it is not always the case). Getting 0 merit increases globally has happened. Many employees are required to travel and that could harm their personal life - management do not care. Being in a very global and multicultural organisation also means you get phone calls during your weekends from Arabic countries or have to resolve issues urgently, or have conference calls late in the evening (depending on the time zones). So, in a nutshell, some (or maybe... many) positions do not have your classic 9 to 5 schedule, but that is not even deemed important.

Advice to Senior Management – Some decisions must be made quickly. Recognise the involvement and dedication.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend – I'm optimistic about the outlook for this company

Former Employee – worked at Baker Hughes full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – Excellent training, opportunities to move worldwide and into different product lines to diversify experience.

Cons – It's a big company with a lot of reorganization and inflating corporate structure. I saw tremendous turnover in my 5 years with BHI. High attrition is, in part, due to not taking care of people - not staying competitive with industry salaries, and organizational instability.

Advice to Senior Management – Take care of your greatest asset - your people. The bleeding will never stop otherwise & you'll be left with inexperience and the mediocrity that goes along with it.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company

Former Employee – worked at Baker Hughes full-time for more than a year

Pros – Travel
Around the world
Nice people
Experience of other people. Analytics, tools

Cons – Away from home
Long hole
Language problems
Stubborn people
Long work hours
Senior management too tight and no structure

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend – I'm not optimistic about the outlook for this company

Current Employee – been working at Baker Hughes full-time for more than 7 years

Pros – Good technology , Nice facilities and also Diversity

Cons – HR function is very weak.
No maternity protection. Management may give away your job permanently to another person during pregnancy or while you are on maternity leave.

Advice to Senior Management – Protect female employees

Current Employee – been working at Baker Hughes full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – Field staff on the whole are a great bunch of people.

Cons – Management choose to provide no career opportunities and so dissatisfaction is rife and the company loses most field staff within a couple of years. This causes a lack of experience in the teams and a fall in the standard of service.

Advice to Senior Management – Provide career opportunities

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Former Employee – worked at Baker Hughes

Pros – Field Exposure
Great people around me to work with
There was great opportunities for training and travel the world as well.

Cons – Being away from family and friends for long periods
Middle management seems confused with the recent reorganisation of the company

Current Employee – been working at Baker Hughes

Pros – good professional staff, great technology and was an innovative and challenging employer

Cons – The organisation has lost its direction with some absolutely awful decisions being made. The merger with BJ on top of the one baker hughes reorganisation was simply madness. There seems to a massive increase in senior managers some of whom lack basic skills and decreasing support for those on the front line. Outsourcing has not ben a success.Additionally how the organisation is treating its staff defies belief. i couldnt recommend this as a place to work for anyone!

Advice to Senior Management – leaders need to be focussed on the business and not try to copy other major service companies. They need to be innovative and seek to engage with their staff who offer a huge asset that is presently not recognised or given opportunities to perform

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Baker Hughes

Pros – Generally a good working environment. Infrastructure as far as reference material / resources is very good. Occaisionally interesting opportunities will arise.

Cons – The first thing that has struck me since reviewing this web page is the difference in salaries between the UK and US - at least within engineering. They seem to pay US employees 50% more than counterparts in the UK? By reading reviews, it appears that American based employees are far more happy with the company than those in the UK and this is probably one of the reasons why.

The majority of processes in place are seen as a big checklist. Having spoken to several staff who have very recently left the company; during their exit interview, HR staff are ticking boxes stating they have asked employees questions - "why are you leaving" etc. but not actually taking down the reasons.

As stated in a previous post, it seems that management dont want to listen to why the staff are unhappy or what changes they would like to see and even if they did are they able to do anything about it? As a result, staff are begining to look for jobs elsewhere for more money.

Advice to Senior Management – Allow management of each location to have more of a say of what goes on there. I'm often hearing that management in the states are calling the shots on what's happening in our department, this is resulting in staff feeling undervalued - especially since we are being paid so much less than those doing the same jobs in the U.S.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at Baker Hughes

Pros – Good starting salary. Fairly laid back place to work. Being a big international company with many divisions could allow for your to chop and change what part of the industry you are involved in. The majority of the workforce worldwide are a great bunch of guys and in Aberdeen engineering particularly it is a particularly good place to work in terms of the relationships with colleagues.

Cons – Morale is at an all time low and management seem unable or unwilling to do anything about it.

Despite a good starting salary, the rate at which this increases over time is so slow that after a few years of starting, the new starts will be earning just as much as you since starting pay seems to increase inline with annual raises and promotions.

Two or three times a week for the last 1-1/2 years there have been emails coming through about new executive managers etc. How many executives do you need? And is it sensible to tell employees who haven't had a pay rise for over a year that yet another new guy is coming in on a 6 figure salary?

Any little perks that have been in existance from the time i started have one by one been taken away. A free bottle of wine at christmas? A £20 voucher? "forget it, we can't afford it".

New PDM process which is so complex, it takes months from being told you will be doing a project to actually starting it, and even when you do, the process is so over the top with teleconferences and checklists that it takes a lot of enjoyment out of the job.

An attitude of hiring because of a required headcount rather than due to workload requirements. Just because you are offered a job, don't expect there to be work waiting for you when you start.

Promotions seem to be time related rather than competance. Whether you could work a grade above you or not, after a set period of time, you will be promoted to that position. Not before, not after. This only serves to stop people trying to develop themselves as they will not be rewarded for it.

HR seem to have an idea of where they want the company to go "attract and retain the best employees", but there is no actions behind their words to back it up. You may want to do all this, but obviously every other company wants to do the same. How are you going to achieve this?

Most importantly, the pay cannot compare to what other companies can pay. Coupled with the points above, this is resulting in a big walkout of staff who are leaving for around 25% more pay to do the same job elsewhere.

There are many more smaller cons to this company, however, I don't want to pick on every little point. These are the main points that need to be adressed and if they are, Baker could be a good place to work for once more.

Advice to Senior Management – Speak to employees!!! This seems like such an obvious solution to halt the impending exodus from this company. Other employers offer much more in the way of "little perks" that make an employee stay put. You really need to start asking your employees what they would like to see change at department level. If nothing else it will make the staff feel a lot more valued than they do right now.

Invest in job specifc training. Whilst there are some good in-house training courses with this company, there is scope to develop courses much more in line to ones specific position.

Treat your staff now and again. We are all aware of the credit crunch and understand that this has affected our pay rises, however, little things like being taken out for dinner once a quarter, or organising some form of free social event would earn you a lot of respect from your staff.

In short, if upper executives start hiring department managers who are much more interested in retaining staff than cutting every cost, the company could actually flourish now. Just look more than 6 months down the line and think where you would like your company to be.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend