customer service representative

senior systems analyst

senior systems administrator

application analyst

assembler

Idaho Power Company

The culture at Idaho Power is a big deal and the values they promote are admirable.  They are not acted out in the workplace as much as they are a written mandate to be theoretically adhered to.  The training was great and there are some wonderful people there.  The call center environment started out as a team environment focused on excellent customer service and employee satisfaction.  These attributes quickly went downhill however as new management took over and the environment became stifling and extremely micro managed.  Most employees there hold in having to go to the bathroom to avoid statistics looking poorly via using "away from desk" time.  The management is quick to advance those who have a relation to other employees in the company and not as quick to advance those who do not.  The environment is very stressful and management steered away from focusing on employee satisfaction as time went by.  Most people are overweight and unsatisfied with their job, always looking forward to Friday (kind of sad) and management thinks that by providing more food as "employee satisfaction" this will keep the worker bees happy.  I don't think that philosophy is healthy nor truly appreciated.  There is rhetoric that upward mobility is encouraged and possible but in my observation over a period of years this isn't the case for many.  Overall, the wages were good but many people only stay because of that.  Keep in mind this job review was in the call center.  But if you want a good paying job for the area, this is a great job, but if you want a fulfilling job with supportive management and an ability to grow then I would say keep looking.  What kept me going in this job was the ability to positively impact others in my day and that became the only motivating factor for me.

I enjoyed working for this company for 9 years, to include the work and engagement with many fellow employees and work groups.  This said, I left the company based on my dissatisfaction with management of the work group.  Employee reviews and surveys (within the work group for which I was employed) indicated serious work group issues with management.  While employed with this company, I experienced a succession of work group managers who were profit-oriented, less educated and/or less experienced than many employees in the work group, hired from outside with little to no advancement opportunity having first been provided to employees in the work group, focused on management salaries and perks and not on employee or work group health and betterment.   Overall, during the past 10 years, the company has continually and considerably increased executive salaries while working to decrease employee salaries for various work groups, to include decreasing employee benefits.  Sadly, in a corporate-oriented vein vacation and sick time which were once adequate and provided separately, are now combined and limited, resulting in many employees regularly attending work when they are ill.   Employee education and enrichment was missing or provided selectively to only a few in the work group and always provided to management. The company seems focused on supporting management and providing opportunities for managers - not employees.

If I could have written two separate reviews on IPCO I would have because, except for working in Customer Service, this is a decent company.  If you're considering working in Customer Service, specifically their call center, I would advise you to run away fast.  

The management culture in IPCO's call center is severely toxic, negative and incompetent.  There exists several leaders among the teams, none of which are technically competent in supervision, and none of which participate in any call activity.  They are negative, extremely disciplinary and constantly are looking for ways to bring people down, instead of building them up.  

The tools they give you to do your job are broken, they have horrible computer systems and very poor training.  They take pride in their 100+ years of existence, but, would not be in existence if it were not for their monopoly.  I feel very fortunate for having escaped IPCO's Customer Service Division.

I now work in a totally different section of the company, and a different building.  The difference is quite amazing as the rest of this company seems to work well, efficiently, great training and great leaders.  If you can stand a few years of horrible, in hopes of moving elsewhere in the company, then you may want to give it a try, otherwise, carefully consider these words from an insider.

Leadership in the Project Management Group is of very questionable character. I discovered after accepting a position with Idaho Power 3 years ago that one current leader not only has a recent criminal record involving confrontation with the police, but was observed making disarranging remarks in public about customers in Oregon. I had to google the incident to believe it. On each embarrassing occasion, upper Management opted to turn a blind eye, and in fact, the individual was promoted. His subordinates were of similar questionable character and the morale of the project management group has suffered greatly. 

Idaho Power focuses greatly on promoting from within which can be problematic from an innovation perspective. The few PMs that have come into the group from outside of Idaho Power have moved on quickly or been let go because of their attempts to bring the company into a more modern culture. I do not feel that I can voice concerns to my management for fear of retaliation. For anyone looking to work in Project Management at Idaho Power, think about how the character of your leaders may impact your career and your reputation.

Although this company has a long history, it does not invest in its employees, even though it prides itself on being "an employer of choice".  They don't allow or sponsor CPE credits for professional certifications (unless its a NERC requirement), and getting them to send you to any sort of continuous education is nearly impossible.

With the exception of the CEO, Idaho Power is filled with poorly educated managers, and advancement seems to be predicated on who you know and friendships or family relationships.  The company is far behind the curve when it comes to current trends and technology that are commonly used in large companies elsewhere.  It seems that the only thing moving this company forward is the fact that they have no competition, but that is starting to change with the declining costs of self generation.

If you have any interest at all in staying competitive in the marketplace, outside of public utilities, you should avoid this company, as they are pretty much still in the Jurassic period when compared to mainstream American business.

If the general public knew how much money was wasted by Idaho power I doubt their rate hike requests would get past the door, let alone approved. This is a company that has a legal monopoly and takes every advantage. The culture is split between an "everyone has value" ideology and "stab your co-worker in the back" reality. The level of bigotry within the line and station crews is pretty sickening as well. That's not to say everyone is like that but it's a fairly significant percentage and one you won't escape. There is a very strong tribal element to the bigotry that crews kind of use to bond. If someone brings up Bud Light for example, you're sure to get a solid 15 minutes of LGBTQ bashing. If some mentions the EV Chargers in front of the offices that will easily invoke a tirade about idiot liberals and management at the Boise HQ shoving woke propaganda down their throats. This place could be such an amazing place to work but it's so hostile on so many levels that you either have to ignore it or saddle up into the tribal element  to succeed

Overall, Idaho Power is a good company but has one serious blind spot (as others here have pointed out).  Morale in the Customer Service area is extremely low, especially in the call center.  Upper management consistently conducts 'pulse' surveys and shares the results with staff, and those results clearly depict what's wrong.  Unfortunately, no positive or constructive change occurs, leaving the problem Leaders in place, and proliferating the lack of trust and unsafe environment that is clearly reflected in the surveys.  Most in customer service scan daily job postings with the hope of escaping to a better part of the company, I was fortunate to have escaped this way.  I would urge senior management to take seriously the pulse survey results and try to create a better environment, less stressful, less negative, less aggressive with more competent H/R and leaders.  A great company with one huge blind spot, avoid customer service if you possibly can.

This company has a rich 100+ year history, however, working in this environment will atrophy any skills you’ve obtained elsewhere.   Many in leadership lack even the most basic undergraduate degrees and act threatened by those that have attained education beyond a high school diploma.  They pride themselves on gut-level decision making and shun attempts to drive data driven decisions.  The culture stifles creativity and reinforces control, leadership maintains an hourly approach to work, and even though they are salaried and exempt, they too are required to fill out bi-monthly time cards.  The 100+ year existence of this company has resulted in a leadership team largely appointed by decades long family and friendship relationships that are loyal to their pedigree. 


Critical thinking seems absent and as a result, working here can be extremely mind numbing.

I applaud leadership's attempts to infuse outside talent into this company however the way they are going about it is haphazard at best. You really need to clean out and replace your lower and mid-level leaders/managers so that new concepts and technology have a chance to take root and thrive. Another way to do that could be to train them or change your expectations in regard to culture change. It feels like a junk of old ways and old technology with the resistance to evolve because the old ways are familiar.  This is putting a big burden on your outside hires having to deal with a culture that says it wants to change but is also resistant to change.

Also, treat your 'exempt' level employees as professionals.  The culture is very 'hourly' and I've never seen a large company that still requires its exempt, salaried employees to do time sheets every two weeks.  Again, very old school and off-putting for those used to other, more professional environments.  You can do much better.

I loved working for Idaho Power up until the last two years of my employment. A new manager came in and changed the lives of several coworkers, as well as mine. After 21 years, I was terminated for not meeting their expectations. I was doing just fine until the new manager came in the picture. Between health issues and missed work, I was put on FMLA. I was able to keep up with my work load. Once the new manager came in, more work kept coming my way. Work that wasn't part of my job duties as a specialist. It was very difficult, if not impossible, to get everything done in a timely manner. I would go home crying at least once a week. I was written up a couple of times for numerous reasons, demoted and finally terminated, all in one year. I always felt like I was being pushed out. They finally got what they wanted. I'm not saying that Idaho Power is a bad place to work. Just the department I worked in.

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