assembly technician

assembler

senior assembly technician

engineer

electrician

Dana

My experience as a supervisor with Dana was one of minimal and ineffective leadership from the front office. The Production Manager loved to micro-manage the smallest details while offering no direction regarding matters of consequence. When problems arose it seemed a higher priority to assign blame than implement a solution. The less seniority you had with the company the more likely you were to be blamed by those with more seniority and the less likely the solutions you offered were even considered. Supervisors were restricted from trouble-shooting issues or making process adjustments on the off-shifts, and then were blamed for poor quality or low production issues the next day. The finger-pointing blame-game between shifts was in full force at Dana, and always taken at face value by the Production Manager without the due diligence of investigating the matter or discussing it with those that were blamed.

In the end my assignment with Dana was terminated without explanation or just cause. When questioned my superiors could offer no negative performance metric or evidence of failure to perform on my part. The impression I was left with was that it boiled down who you played golf with or who you were in bed with, literally. The type of people that were advanced or secure in their position were the most unprofessional, immature, bullying, sycophantic or promiscuous members of management because of who they were friends with.

This might just be the location that I worked at, and the people I worked with. I am not insinuating that this is indicative of the company as a whole. If you choose to work for Dana I hope your experience is much more positive than mine was.

Typical day with Dana before shift started all employees be there early and in our designated meeting area, have our shift meeting and I’d find out where I would be working that day. Go to my work area and start my shift so some days I’d be alone working at the “carasel” which is where I print out orders and set them up in a fold crate I would pull the parts and place them in the crate and make sure to keep an eye on parts, I would also do a check list on if I had parts I needed to order so we never ran out, make tags and double check my work and mark off the items inter the order in the system and tape a paper with the order number and the order instructions/ directions and blue prints all go inside the crate as well as the tags and tag identifications so that the person who ended up assembling the item had everything. Then I would get on my forktruck and take it out to the line or area it needed to be so it was able to be assembled. Sometimes I would use an order picker and reach truck fork truck. I learned how to use a fork truck, order picker as well as making sure to use the correct ppe. My manager was very laid back and gave me a lot of responsibilities, the hardest part of the job would be that another shift didn’t put correct parts in my crate if I was on the line or they didn’t order anything or no kind of communication between shifts. It’s a lot better if you speak to the last person at your station or line and if anything happened and if we had everything, if I needed anything or to watch things. I enjoyed everything about Dana I loved my job and the people 

Your typical day starts with getting there on time which is difficult because the clocks tend to not be in sync, you have a shift meeting, then move on to your assigned work area, you do your start up procedures(paperwork, safety check offs and "feedback" with the previous operator) and finish in the time allowed so you can move into position to do your job. The problems are 1 -  The atmosphere in our plant is borderline hostile/threatening  between upper management and employees and upper management seems to encourage this. 2 - We work MANY overtime hours and weekends with no upper management or salary support and yet are told constantly it is because WE have to much absenteeism. ( we tend to have salary meetings held most of the dayshift hours so there are many weekday hours there is no one there for support) 3 - Moral is at the lowest i have ever personally seen and daily they find a way to bring it down more, the overall feeling is we are being set up to fail which seems ridiculous but is not.
Everyday when i walk through the door i worry about what is going to be put out on the floor today to stir up the employees, it is a daily constant thing to deal with and makes for a very unstable floor to stay positive and do good work.
Many have expressed their concern for our jobs and our company, we want it to succeed, but now, with the ones that run our campus, not many of us if any " on the floor employees" can see that happening.

I was a controls engineering intern for four months at DANA Corp. The engineer I worked under was very knowledgeable, easy and fun to work with. Everyone treated me very well and were very friendly. The pay was well below the industry standard for engineering interns. Despite them being pleased with my performance and still needing work done, they didn't let me stay on part time while I attended school. My time there consisted of mainly doing AutoCAD for electrical and hydraulic systems of the plants machines. I was tasked with updating the drawings for these systems, some of which hadn't been properly updated for 10 years or more. I was given a lot of freedom to do the projects the way I wanted and in the order I wanted. The location I worked at was union, so it was a pain trying to do my work sometimes. I couldn't open a panel to trace wires without an electrician opening the panel for me and staying there the whole time. I couldn't even touch anything even if they were there, so it made doing my job very difficult. Overall it was a very good experience, I learned much more than I thought I would, and they gave me an opportunity even though I hadn't even finished my freshman year. Overall very pleased with my experience with them.

My Father retired from Dana Corp around 1999 or 2000. After working there for over 30 years, busting his A** for them almost everyday, he retired. Shortly after he was diagnosed with Cancer. He fought it for many years. BUT during that time Dana Corp decided that the same people that spent most of their lives working for them, making them millions, they would screw those same people over. To save the company money, they decided to take away what the retirees had been promised. They did away with a big portion of their retiree benefits. Including their dental and vison insurance and most importantly, they took away their LIFE INSURANCE... over 30+ years my Father broke his back for this company and to show their gratitude, they screw them out of what was rightfully theirs. My Father passed away 2 years ago this May.. No, he did not get a proper burial, all we could afford was to have him cremated.. So if you decide you want to go work for a good company that will set you up for retirement.. Dana Corp is NOT the place.. once you are done working for them they dont give a SH** about you. Infact, I will never again purchase anything made by them.. by choice.. they dont deserve my business.. they got over 30 years of my Dads life and said to hell with him once he was done. They are a heartless company. That is my review of Dana Corp.

This job is not for everyone. For those that don't mind working a lot of overtime. This job might be for you. Plenty of money to be made here thats for sure. The temps however walk into a 12 hour shift daily. It's either 6-6 or 2-2, 10-10. And that's 7 days a week not exaggerating. No respect for people's home life at all. Management spends their entire day worrying about what the employees on the floor are doing instead of focusing on the tasks that they are hired to perform. They take pictures of the employees and hold countless meetings daily to blame the employees for not hitting their numbers. But the fact of the matter is we run parts that are not on the days run because we either run out of components which drives the need for mandatory Saturdays and Sundays, or the engineering team can't get equipment to run without calling in a outside source to fix these equipment issues. That also drives the mandatory Saturdays and Sundays.This place is so poorly managed on a daily basis from lack of support from the engineering team, upper management to the Supervisors. If you can handle all the inconveniences and incompetence you can make $100k a year on the floor.

I learned a working for Dana through Dana learning programs or seeing best in class processes or idea's through the supply base and for that I will always be appreciative.

My peers and other employees were great to work with and some of them I still consider friends.

However, you need to watch your back also with all levels of management. They take mistakes personally.

In a fast pace environment, you may have to make a decision that may be right or wrong. The management team does not remember all the correct decisions you've made or the Friday night calls to be somewhere first thing SATURDAY morning, but they will remember the 1 or 2 mistakes you've made even if you were pushed into that decision.

You DO NOT want to be a woman in the Engineering Department at Dana. It's a "Good Ole' Boy Club" and good luck getting a simple promotion, a decent raise or a good review.

I respect the CEO of Dana and like the direction he is taking the company. However, he needs to look at his direct reports and even their mid-level managers.

Just an FYI - Dana has a great 401K Match but they also have a High Deductible Insurance Plan



There is mandated overtime 6 to 7 days a week. They can make you come in 4 hours early or stay 4 hours late (12 hour work day) and you don't know which your doing (early or late) until 2 hours before your regular shift ends that day. So on afternoons you are supposed to work 3 to 11:30. You won't find out until 9:30 that night if you are mandated to stay until 3 am or if you are mandated to come in at 11:30 am the next morning. Also you do not find out if you have to work the weekend until Friday 2 hours before you shift ends. Weekends can be Saturday and/or Sunday 8 or 12 hours. No teamwork what so ever. Drama and gossip is high. People are rude, the union is useless and does nothing for you yet you have to pay union dues. EVERYTHING is seniority based. So the same people get hit with the constant mandated overtime and the same people are always high enough on seniority that they never get hit. It never rotates. HR is unhelpful, and rude. Make you feel like you are bother them by asking a question or trying to file a complaint. 
You are supposed to rotate positions every 2 hours but that definitely doesn't always happen. Many times for overtime you are out back on the same spot you were on so you have to wait for someone to possibly come cover you so you can take a 15 min break and go right back for another 2 hours.

We did architectural woodworking, our main customer was Dillards. We did alot of other stores but Dillards was our main customers. We over saw the customers orders from design to installation at the job site. Not everything was the same always something different to work on whether it was a new showcase design or remolding a store. Most difficult part of the job was language barrier, we employed Bosnians, Russians, Vietnamese, Cambodian's, people from all over the world and at the same time it may have made it difficult at times but also rewarding to be able to bring that many different cultures together to work for one common cause. The most enjoyable part of the job was the fact I was teaching people a skilled trade whether it was reading blueprints runnning table sawsm assemblng fixtures, laminating or painting, the people were learning a skilled trade they could take out into the real world. Hardest part was when we had to close the plant, 911 got us, work was not there after 911 and we did not have the resources to stay in business.

The good : This was overall a great job experience for me I worked here almost 4 years. It was my first factory job, I didn’t have any experience at all in manufacturing when I started here. I had never driven a forklift or with dies or pneumatic presses. I started as just a normal operator and worked my way up to material handling then became a team leader all within 2 years. But it is something you have to work for. If you go into this company with a mindset of what you want to achieve you can make it happen with hard work. The bad : The attendance policy is ridiculous anything over 5.5 points and your terminated. And the precious union can’t do squat about it. And half a point is 1 hour and 59 minutes. Anything over that is a whole point. I saw several good workers lose their Job over this. The management is mostly good. Decent people to work for. The Human Resources department on the other hand needs to be less about always finding ways to tell employees no or making up excuses for simple problems and more about helping them out. Good luck getting them on the phone if you ever need them. 

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Assembly technician 24 salaries reported	$18.00 per hour
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