Pacific Gas and Electric Reviews

I have been working at Pacific Gas and Electric full-time for more than 8 years

Pros – Pay, Benefits, Flexiable schedule, no watch dog mentality. Friendly Co-Workers, Modern technology and very reflective of diversity of people working in company.

Cons – Buercracey upper management. Too many business process loop holes. Too many middle people who don't know their job descpription. Too many Contract Employees.

Advice to Senior Management – Learn your department before you ask us to ask you questions that you can't answer!

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

I worked at Pacific Gas and Electric full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – Benefits...which most companies offer - health, dental,401k plan etc. There is a possibility of being ok if you manage to get in a "decent department" under decent management.

Cons – -Good old boys club in management - been at PG&E for years, but are not skilled or competant
-HR sides with management, so they can do whatever they want to you - harass, bully, unfair -evaluations, illegitimate demotions, discrimination, held hostage in your job when you want to transfer
Penalties for management when they do all the above are "getting a coach" or watching a video
-Excessive Top layers while cutting layers at the bottom, the ones at the bottom do all the work!. Thus most employees are overworked because they are doing not one, but two or three jobs.
-A whole bunch of re-orgs for no reason, Old school atmosphere, less advanced programs
*Older employees have voiced there suffering in this environment but hold on to hope to "start living" when they retire.

Advice to Senior Management – Legal intervention will cost the company greatly, so try to remain in compliance with company's policies and laws.

I worked at Pacific Gas and Electric as an intern for less than a year

Pros – -For an internship, good pay in addition to having decent, various benefits, such as 401k.
-Friendly work environment
-Steady 8-to-5 working hours.

Cons – -Was not given an office access card for a month!
-Work was too easy at times; my supervisor sometimes ran out of legitimate work for me to do.

Advice to Senior Management – -Found it a little difficult to interact with the management since they seemed so busy and occupied with other things. Could have wished to been given more direction. My direct supervisor was very good however at explaining the purpose behind the work I was given.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at Pacific Gas and Electric full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – Good pay, excellent benefits and that's pretty much it.

Cons – IT senior directors and middle management are completely dysfunctional. 1) No sense of accountability especially in the ISTS department where trouble tickets would sit for days and only worked on by a few dedicated employees. 2) IT Projects are never planned correctly and ends up being descoped due to lack of funding 3) Codependent relationship between Business and IT with most IT managers being pushed around by Business to meet unreasonable deadlines. 4) Contractors are King with some working for PG&E for years. Employees are expected to work unreasonable overtime and being on-call without being compensated accordingly. 5) Thinking outside the box and showing any initiative are always met with indifference and definitely no recognition.

Advice to Senior Management – Need major rethinking around accountability, developing a healthy relationship with Business and especially employee retention -- the pay and the benefits are not enough.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

I worked at Pacific Gas and Electric full-time for more than 8 years

Pros – Excellent wages, benefits, steady employment

Cons – MId level and higher management too centered on protecting own job to be effective leaders. Little reciprocation of loyalty towards subordinates. Identifying and correcting problems secondary to cya.

Advice to Senior Management – Provide genuine direction and support for solutions. Be consistent and utilize proven practices. Stop trying to reinvent the company every three years, which leads to unreasonable amounts of regulation and confusion. Attitude is more important than bureaucratic micromanagement.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

I have been working at Pacific Gas and Electric part-time for more than a year

Pros – There are a lot of opportunities to grow within the company. The company also treats their employees with respect.

Cons – Depending on the position, it may take longer to advance. Parking can be difficult at times.

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

I worked at Pacific Gas and Electric as an intern for less than a year

Pros – Got to experience doing real work and not some busy work made up for an intern.
Traveled fairly often to various project sites to ensure that the crew were getting the parts and equipment they needed to get the job done.
HR put on a couple of field trips and activities for inters that were fun too.

Cons – None that come to mind.... well some of the online safety training is quite lengthy and dry.

Advice to Senior Management – Respect and take care of all employees - this was true in my department, but not all departments.

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

I have been working at Pacific Gas and Electric full-time for more than a year

Pros – Lots of resources and friendly people. Work is easy, but hard to keep you occupied.

Cons – The work can sometimes be too easy...surprisingly possible.

Advice to Senior Management – Describe jobs better to keep employees longer.

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

I have been working at Pacific Gas and Electric full-time

Pros – Lots of opportunities for upward progression as the company's current employees retire, good work-life balance and benefits, focus on turning the company around and investing in operational and customer-related elements is bringing momentum to change

Cons – Stuffy, bureaucratic and conservative culture does not make it an innovative or fun place to work, or an easy place to get things done. As a younger employee, I have few peers and don't feel as though the company is concerned about my development

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

I worked at Pacific Gas and Electric full-time

Pros – Good salary, good benefits, worked with great, talented folks until I left.

Cons – Where do I begin. From late 2011 until somewhat recently, the Information Security department hemorrhaged employees. It started with a *mass* lay off in late 2011, and then attrition took over as dismal moral followed suit. One only needs to do a casual search on LinkedIn to see the exodus of folks from the organization since late 2011 with IT security credentials. The drama began when the old CIO left and a new CIO came in - with no energy sector experience. While seemingly ambitious and pleasant, she began to fire people almost as quickly as she started. Many people got laid off in the process, to include the CISO at the time. The CISO was replaced by an internal candidate who was also a seemingly pleasant guy, but would also have rally prep talks and then proceed to sign folks termination papers. While I no doubt believe he was following orders from above, he is every bit as responsible for the slow demise of the department.

The feeling of mistrust is pervasive in much of IT and especially Information Security. It's disappointing because it didn't have to be that way. This is a symptom of the regressive steps taken to create a more "lean, agile" department. While this goal was and is worthwhile, core staff was alienated in the process of doing so that were with the department for a long time. As a company with a laundry list of information security concerns, this would seem rather counter productive.

Bottom line: there have been a lot of job postings for PG&E this year, looking for "CISSPs" and that is because a ton of people left. If you want a stable job, if you want to be able to actually trust management, if you do not want to deal with corporate cuts, stay away from this organization.

Advice to Senior Management – What has taken place over the past year would be fitting for an MBA program case study in how "not to eviscerate your IT security organization". While there were a lot of dinosaurs that found their way to the door, there were a lot of neat, innovative programs that were axed as well. Don't fool yourself thinking the right decisions were made because clearly you see an organization with the vast majority of people that were there a year ago - gone. And all that knowledge and talent with it.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend