Premier Rides Reviews

Premier Rides is a tragic organization, considering its potential for being a terrific workplace with an exciting product. Tragic also because of the the incredibly long list of disillusioned, bitter ex-employees and interns that have come and gone. Premier is in the business of designing, fabricating, assembling and commissioning complex, unique, multi-million dollar coaster ride systems all over the world. At present (April 2015), it has no less than five (5) such international projects going concurrently. Yet, the President intentionally staffs Premier with a "skeleton crew" staff of interns, newly-minted engineers, and offsite mercenaries. The poor economy insures an abundant supply of such employees, despite the negative reputation surrounding employment at Premier. There is not one experienced MBA-level project manager working presently at Premier - and each of the five (5) projects mentioned above, merits it's own project manager. But President cannot and/or will not hire any strong, experienced MBA/PMP level managers, because they would demand authority the President will not confer, and/or they would not be able to put up with the CFO's unprofessionalism. Premier is run by a President and a CFO, neither of whom are qualified by talent, temperament or training, to run any kind of employee-based business organization. Current President bought the business from the founder (who actually established Premier's credibility in the industry). Premier is now essentially running on the past credibility created by the founder. Current President is a profound non-communicator, with a bizzare, sullen, taciturn personality devoid of human empathy, and also apparently devoid of any motivation to regard his employees as anything other than disposable finger-puppets. CFO is an incredibly loud, opinionated, vulgar man with a wise-guy bully personality. This CFO (and thus Premier) has been on the wrong end of at least one EEOC legal action in connection with CFO's behavior. President refuses to fire CFO. Both President and CFO have other businesses (President is a landlord, and CFO is a CPA), which consume much of their attention.

Premier Rides is basically a revolving door for employees due to the way the company is managed. Lucky for them they have an almost endless supply of willing workers because people are intrigued to design and build roller coasters and amusement rides. Management seems only interested in the "image" of the company and not the actual product. When I started working there approximately 75% of the employees had been at the company less than 6 months. That being the case, you would think the owner would be engaged with his employees and enthusiastic about teaching them how to do their jobs. Well, you would have thought wrong. The owner spends all of time either in his glass-walled office writing emails and watching TV (yes, he has a large flat-screen TV on his wall) or traveling. He even has his own personal bathroom in his office so he basically never has to leave it. In my time working there I can count the number of times I had a conversation with the owner or controller on one hand. They mainly hire employees right out of college. There are almost no experienced people there. For something as critical as a roller coaster you would expect there to be a high level of oversight but there is none. You basically show up, get assigned a project, and have to muddle your way through it. Almost all of the work is outsourced to suppliers that do the structural engineering, make the track, and make the coaster cars. As soon as something goes wrong, the finger pointing begins and the paranoia sets in. The owner won't own up to any mistakes that are caused by the company and immediately tries to shift all blame to the vendors. It seemed like most of the other employees were just sticking around long enough to get some experience for their resumes and then move on. Lucky for me this was not my first job out of college so I didn't need to stick around to pad my resume.