Whiting-Turner Reviews

Management is very old school- "live to work" went out about 20 years ago. Yes- construction has never been a 9 to 5 job, but when your protocol is inefficient and requires employees to triplicate information in various databases or generate multiple reports on a monthly basis because Sr. management won't look it up in said database, who is left to actually run the construction project we didn't have enough GCs to man in the first place? Efficiency, although preached, is never something the company is aggressive about resolving- especially if there is a cost associated with it. The ability to make quick, efficient decisions doesn't happen- we can build buildings quicker than we can resolve internal inefficiencies. There is a huge gap between levels of PE's to APMs to PM and in the higher PM levels (3+ to senior) as well. We make a better chorus line than a cheerleading pyramid with our hierarchy. Those who work hard and have stuck with the company are pushed to work longer hours, travel (unless you are one of the "lucky ones" who've never travelled for the company), and give up all semblance of a personal life with either no or minimal compensation, bonuses, profit sharing, etc. When it comes to hiring- again- our inability to make quick decisions means we are hiring the "B Team" because the "A Team" has already been scooped up by competitors. We wait too long to hire PEs and then stick them on a project and expect them to run the whole thing their 2nd week of work. We should have been hiring and training them 2 years ago so we could have them ready to work when needed. Quality of some employees is way below par. Throughout the recession, the company declared they "would not layoff any good people", we didn't lay off the bad ones either. Approval for reimbursement of classes, certifications, etc. takes an army. What once was the company standard of training falls by the way side with the cancelled training sessions month after month (although we still use our "monthly training" schpeel as a selling point in presentations). Advocate program has gone by the way side since there were costs associated with it. The focus has become to maintain the relationship, but pretty much at your own cost, unless you fight and make a stink about it. Who has time to fight these smaller battles when your project is a 60 hour a week job plus you're travelling 2 hours to work one way each day and you want to have a personal life? Travel packages for those out of town no longer take care of the employees for their sacrifice. I shouldn't be paying the company to work out of town, nor should it take months to reimburse employees for out of pocket costs associated with a temporary relocation.

Generally the hiring range for new grads is 10% lower than the competition. The 401k program is good but there is no match unless senior leadership feels they are losing to many folks. There is a pension and ESPP that you qualify for if you stay longer than 5 years. Whiting-Turner decided that their pension system which grows at about 5% annually is better than another vehicle. Clearly, it is for Whiting-Turner as most don't stay for 5 years. The VP will tell you all about projected income growth over a 40 year career there, often stating that you earn more over time than any other GC. This simply isn't true. Tripling your income over 40 year career is not a good track to be on as most salaries and careers in any industry double every 7 years or so. The minimum working week at Whiting-Turner Denver is about 70 hours a week, that's 5- 12's M-F plus extra if something comes up...(it's construction something always comes up), plus you get to work a weekend on a rotation with the others on your project. If times are slow where you will work in the office 40-50 hours a week. The Denver office, in general is far more difficult to work for than all other locations. The structure is simple and you're told its like a family business. This is not the case. Turnover at Denver is at least double the average of Whiting-Turner nationwide and good people keep leaving and will keep leaving.