Golder Associates Reviews

Pros

Fulfilling and challenging work with a diversity of projects and exposure in the group I work for

Cons

1 - Poor project management in the group that I work for. 2 - Not as forward thinking as could be. Many menial tasks aren't yet automated. 3 - Not really cons for me (more of a Pro), but could be cons for some: the group I work in is less structured and relies on people to be self managed and able to learn on the fly.

Pros

Professional and good people to work with

Cons

Re-structuring due to economy is apparent

Advice to Management

Financial stability

Pros

Good benefits Employee owned - option to buy shares Social feeling to office

Cons

Low pay Uncertainty of job security in non-engineering roles

Advice to Management

Up the pay scales for administrative staff, especially starting employees No one can survive in Vancouver on under $40k/year

Pros

Great teammates, lots of variety in project

Cons

Low pay compared to competitors, lack of support from senior employees, heavy workload

Pros

Good salary and Benefits, pension

Cons

Bad intentioned and incompetent managers tolerated only because the many years with the company.

Pros

I met a few interesting people - thats it.

Cons

You know, it doesn’t seem to matter how large a company is, or what their scope of work is, or what how the economy is. Golder, like many others, is just another example of a company that can screw you over. *For a company that’s into sustainability, they certainly throw away a lot of trash, a lot of paper is wasted. Yes they compost and recycle, but still, a lot of wasted in the first place so that much... recycling and composting shouldn’t even have to take place. Lots of food is wasted and thrown away when they could give it to a local food bank or drop it off to homeless people. It’s very ridiculous. *Bullying and harassment is a big issue, despite there being a policy stating that they don’t tolerate it, so that was entirely pointless. This happened with project managers as well as throughout the company with very rude and tensional behavior coming from staff who are supposed to respecting the entire organization. *In Burnaby (now moved to Renfrew station in Vancouver), their corporate services has the biggest turnover in all the offices in Canada due to disgruntled workers, sick leave, stress, and the aforementioned bullying and harassment. Despite managers knowing about this, nothing was done at all to fix these problems. *If you’re not a chargeable employee, you’re basically nothing at all and just a pawn, therefore you’re expendable. *Golder lied big time about job security. They hired MANY people in 2010-2012, painting the picture that they were expanding and doing well, only to suddenly lay off 300 people across the entire country, including those that had been with the company for well over a decade. The excuse was that they were having financial difficulty. This is a lie because I know for a fact that we were winning a lot of jobs and everybody’s workload was increasing. If there were lags in other departments, transfers could have been done instead. Either way, they screwed up big time. It’s one of those companies that hires people and then lays them off, a very sick tactic. They even had a golf tournament and a party gala shortly thereafter, which really upset a lot of people. *For a place that stresses health and safety, there were a lot of accidents and incidents on site. Even in the office there are so many hazards and dangers, like people talking in hallways, things being left on the floor, rotting food in the fridge, and outlets that have caused power surges. *Despite promises for growth and career advancement, this never happened. There were no raises, yet they expected you to work through lunch hours and overtime and not get paid for it. This was also a major lie by Golder just to get people to stick around and “hope”. The only reason people stay here is just because they need a job, but if another offer came their way or they didn’t need the money, they wouldn’t be there. What’s more annoying is that in the interviews process and such, they mention the “unlimited” opportunities to move around the company. However, whenever many of us chased such requests, they were stalled, delayed, or never happened at all. You have to be there for a VERY long time in order to get somewhere, but you will probably get laid off first or quit before you can get there. *The IT help desk is very busy, and for the wrong reasons. This is because the main component software was just awful and kept on crashing and breaking down, leading to delays in work and server crashes. *Very old school management style and if you look around on various “company review” websites, you will see many people say this. The managers/principles are not open to change or listening to feedback. When someone wants to speak with them, they claim to be inviting, but then they won’t be open to a meeting. If they were, the feedback may be received but not implemented at all. *The company throws money out the window on frivolous costs, such as ordering pointless food for meetings, a lot of money on unnecessary landscaping, wasted office paper, parties and client events, and even charity organizations. While I’m not against the last one, they should make sure employees are happy as well, but yet they could have easily cut other costs and retained employees. Instead of throwing money away, I think employees could use a little extra well deserved money in their pockets. *My supervisor and their boss were incredibly lazy and provided no training on the job, nor feedback on performance was given. No manuals set up to use for the job despite being there for nearly 10 years, and blaming us for any mistakes when they didn’t explain things at all or in a clear fashion. Even after 3 months, no review was conducted to any of my team members also, even those that were there for a long time. Yet if you committed an error which wasn’t your fault, you would get ridiculed because of it. We all signed a contract that stated that reviews would take and they violated those terms. Who does that ? *Salaries here are low compares to other companies, large or small, and the benefit plan is very mediocre at best. *The moral is very low in the company, and the level of respect throughout the company towards its employees is also ridiculously low. There’s a LOT more, but I can only put in a certain amount of words!. So at the end of the day, take a look online and you’ll see a few of these, but this is what I experienced for the 4 years I was there. Do yourself a favor. Don’t consult with this company and certainly don’t apply to this place. It’s an awful place to work and you will go in there with a low salary, overworked, stressed out, and you will never be happy. Plus your job is NEVER safe and there’s NO growth opportunity. But oh, they will certainly try to convince you that it’s there. Go elsewhere please!

Advice to Management

Take a good look at the reviews on this site already. Low pay, bullying and harassment, old school systems, affected lives, disorganization, no structure, and so on. PERHAPS things are different in other locations, but in the Lower Mainland and from what happened to Canada in 2012, that was very despicable to ruin that many lives at that time. I hope you’re happy! After the massive layoff back in 2012, I don’t... know how you people can sleep at night.

Pros

Golder has an amazing focus on health and safety, and the well-being of its employees. People constantly check up on you to see if you are doing okay and will go out of their way to make sure you have all the resources you need.

Cons

I do not have any complaints.

Advice to Management

Keep it up!

Pros

Opportunity for continued training, can bank overtime, full benefits, team atmosphere

Cons

Long hours, always tight deadlines