AECOM Reviews

Former Employee – worked at AECOM

Pros – Good people and managers. Steady work load to keep you busy.

Cons – Lacking in company funded events

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend

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

Pros – well recognized name in the industry ....apart from that cant think of any

Cons – Its a corporate jungle with no specific direction and strategy ..just cant help to think that this company is nothing but house of cards just waiting for right trigger to collapse under its own weight

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 AECOM full-time for more than 3 years

Pros – Some interesting projects (run by pocket filling clowns). Some good people, unfortunately they generally don't last long!

Cons – Billable hours (the "U" word - utilisation) must be 87% billable, inefficiency due to zero training is punishable by death. Communication and internal politics are also a real issue (old legacy companies fight it out for control instead of benefiting from obvious synergies). Training is non existent and you have to threaten to leave prior to any raise above 1.5%, it makes you sick!

Advice to Senior Management – Listen to your staff. Communicate with your staff, not just each other in your stupid steering groups.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

Current Employee – been working at AECOM

Pros – If you are a hard worker with good skills and would want a chance to work on mega projects, this would be a good company to come to. If you can stomach the feel good lies from the corporate propaganda and just concentrate on your own work, then AECOM is for you.

Cons – If you want to feel appreciated, and be paid based on performance and not who knows what, then do not come to AECOM.
IT system is a mess, they keep laying off IT staff and spending money on computer components that do not help improve performance.

Advice to Senior Management – Take a look at who is doing most of the work, who does the work correctly, and who just has years of work under their belt. Stop paying people just because they have years of experience and start paying the up and comers who are being leaned on to finish the work.
Get a new IT manager and build an IT system that works. We were told it takes 10 days to get a new computer from the day a new computer is requested. Truth is it took 6 months and even then the hardware choices are questionable.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

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

Pros – It provided me with experience, albeit very limited in scope, with which to secure a job at a far superior firm.

Cons – Aside from saving his own hide, all my manager cared about was padding his retirement fund.
Aside from saving her own hide, all the next most senior employee cared about was obtaining the office manager's job.

Training new staff and keeping current staff occupied were unheard of, as younger staff would regularly have only four hours of work during an eight hour work day. Unsurprisingly, there was virtually no mentorship or communication between managers and junior staff.

Thanks to the chaos caused by AECOM buying up any small and mid-sized engineering and environmental company they could, a litany of good, talented, hard-working employees left for greener pastures, while AECOM did nothing to better the situation.

Advice to Senior Management – Either retire or smarten up.
Listen to your employees.
Since we all know the later will never happen, just retire.

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 AECOM full-time for more than 10 years

Pros – Good location, flexible hours, decent co-workers, interesting work. Occasional boxes of donuts and monthly pizza lunches keep the majority of pee-ons quiet.

Cons – Work performance is irrelevant, sucking up to appropriate people is better. Raises, especially as a senior in any capacity are basically non-existent. One half percent to a whopping 1.5 percent are considered good! Times are tough and the CEO and other management cronies need their bonuses after all. 100 dollars less to each employee across the globe adds up to a lot of cash for management bonuses. Regular workers don't get bonuses and rarely a thank you or even acknowledgement of existence unless they should dare to be sick for more than 3 days in a row. HR is a joke at best - don't EVER go to them regarding a conflict between a manager and yourself. They run to the manager and blab word for word what was discussed. Shamefully unprofessional! I could go on for ever and a day, but this isn't the preview for a book, just take my word for it. This isn't a good company if you are looking for huge job satisfaction. Tolerable at best. A good ol' boys club.

Advice to Senior Management – Getting rid of the CEO and at least half of the senior vice-presidents around the globe would be a great start. How about no more bonuses, tax free benefits, company shares, big raises, etc, for management either? Practice what you preach. If times are so tough, why don't you lead by example? It's hard for staff to swallow your garbage when you don't know anything about what you are suggesting.

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

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

Pros – Great opportunities to work in different offices internationally. Being a large, multi-disciplinary company, there are opportunities to gain experience on large-scale projects. Access to AECOM's technical experts through 'Technical Practice Network'.

Cons – These comments apply to the North American water business line only. The business lacks leadership. Recent poor performance and layoffs have led to large staff turnover and extremely low morale. Project quality is suffering. Too many layers of management, and it's not clear what they all do.

Advice to Senior Management – Increase focus on project quality. Recruit/promote more dynamic leadership for the North American region.

No, I would not recommend this company to a friend

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

Pros – Free coffee, good co-workers, looks good on resume.

Cons – Too many layers of management doing who knows what. Bullying mid-level management concerned only with cutting costs. No development of talent. No training. Inefficient use of valuable talent. Technology repressive culture due to poor IT management. No local leadership, mentoring, or professional development. Internal transfer opportunity promotion is not true.

Advice to Senior Management – Wake up! Lots of good people looking to show what they can really do.

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 AECOM full-time for more than 10 years

Pros – Incredible projects, the very talent staff and true global experience and reach. Many talk of being global few achieve it. AECOM is a global powerhouse that attracts the best and brightest.

Cons – Change is a constant. Some thrive and others never do. Not a company if you like to think parochially and you cannot collaborate.

Advice to Senior Management – Drive shareholder value, keep explaining the strategy and how staff can contribute and staff alignment will be achieved

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

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

Pros – AECOM gives you a chance to work throughout all areas and help develop your skills in a wide variety of engineering areas rather than focus you to one particular group.

Cons – It is a big commercial engineering company that is publicly traded so there is no chance to ever becoming an associate.

Advice to Senior Management – Bonuses should be increased and promotions should reflect personal growth and performance rather than the groups.

Yes, I would recommend this company to a friend