AECOM reviews

AECOM talks a good game in all its corporate material about being client focused and valuing its staff with a culture of collaboration.. Within days it is blatently obvious to all new starters that this is not remotely the case. Lots of managers on huge salaries, very little leadership, accountability or discretionary decision making ability. Hire and fire mentality, very high staff turnover, no loyalty to staff. Constant internal networking is required if you don't want to be marginalised given the huge size of the firm with new people constantly brought in and others fired. Moral is low, you think it can't get any lower and it does due to yet another baffling management decision that no one will take any responsibility for e.g. Wasting money on corporate bs, senior management junkettes and then sacking hard working technical staff to cut costs. Pay rises are minimal - negiotiate very hard on starting salary. Lots of office politics and in fighting as each team and individual scrambles for billable work to avoid the sack on a week to week basis, very draining. Everything boils down to a number on a timesheet that is looked at by some distant manager you've never met let alone worked with. The matrix structure is confusing, poorly implemented, badly communicated and completely meaningless for most staff, except senior management. There is a culture of blatent propaganda which is increasingly getting on people's nerves.

The red tape involved in moving from one project or team to another makes it seem easier to just switch employers altogether than trying to move within AECOM. A lot of the difficulties seem to come from apathy in the lower management levels, and a serious reluctance to change. It resulted in most of my brightest young coworkers quitting because they felt stuck in a rut after a couple years.