forklift operator

machine operator

maintenance technician

production technician

process technician

Plastipak Packaging, Inc.

Management increasingly didn't seem to know what it was doing.  For example:

-Things were literally more stable and effective, in terms of hiring/firing/general staffing, when we had NO formal HR person and were hiring EXCLUSIVELY through a temp agency. 

-Scheduling for what product lines were supposed to be running were increasingly erratic, inaccurate, and changed last second because whoever was scheduling was not competent.  

-We had increasingly little work due to whoever is responsible for obtaining/maintaining clients and contracts seemed to be either incompetent or nonexistent.  

-Half of the supervisors were kind and supportive, and the other half incompetent sh*theels who typically just made problems literally WORSE by their presence, not better, but ALL of them spent 95% of their time in their little office rather than doing their job (i.e.patrolling the floor and seeing how they could improve worker morale, output, production value, etc.), and would often needlessly release work schedules that would just be changed the next day.

Are you making money hand-over-foot for the company, effectively paying the salaries of these bumbling nobodies?  They don't care.  You can massively increase production #'s, improve your work station, improve the accuracy and consistency of workers on your line, and most rapidly and effectively train new employees!.........Doesn't matter, they will still ride your *ss about tiny absolutely insignificant things, treat you like you're not working hard even when you're busting your *ss more than most of the other employees on the floor (and even inspiring those around you to work harder and enjoy their work more) and certainly more than they are.  Have you helped them literally do their job and saved them from getting in trouble with THEIR bosses?  They'll still needlessly throw you under the bus THAT SAME DAY..........there is just no winning.

For the amount of aggravation and disrespect you'll suffer here under current "management", the pay isn't worth it when there are other, better opportunities in terms of finances and respect elsewhere.  Particularly given that it's been in steady decline for years now and seems to just keep getting worse.

.....Oh, and the benefits are pretty terrible.  Their "medical insurance" involves paying literally thousands of dollars in a given year before they even kick in and fund anything for you, like medical insurance is supposed to.

Don't waste your time with this company. Everyone who is there is on the "me, me, me" mindset. They will only care for themselves and not care about helping you or doing the right thing. I thought I would be able to change the management's view point but sadly I was wrong and was thrown under the bus where nobody wanted to work with me because I was standing up for the subordinates and their wrongdoings. Management has no official education or training and their believes are not ethical. They are willing to screw over their employees and the companies they work with just to get by. Falsifying documents to have other companies pay for mistakes they knew about but didn't want to waste time fixing. The pay for certain workers is great for others it is pennies for what they do. I feel sorry for the people that are trapped working there because they have no other choice. Management will tell you one thing to get you hired then when you start working you are doing stuff you never thought you would do. Employees are sadly unappreciated and management has no management skills or leadership for sure! I can't even begin to explain the horrible mindset management has to accomplish work, then fire employees when they are caught doing the "wrong" things to hide their own mistakes. Mark my words you will regret working for this company. 
*You will work most weekends even when they say you won't.
*You will not have holidays off, even when they say you will
*Your schedule will change, even if they say it is a set schedule, they changed everyone's schedule with 9 days notice, they don't care about your life, your kids, your responsibilities you will have to figure it out.
*Temp workers have more authority over you
*Nobody will back you up if you think anything is wrong, you are on your own, if you work for them just shut your mouth and don't say a word or else be prepare to get fired or forced to quit (even when regional HR managers get involved they let management know who said what so don't blow your cover if you need a job)
*You will have more overtime than you know what to do with
* You will be miserable, give it less than a month to figure it out.

"talent management" made this place seem like it was the best company to work for in the good ole USA; sadly that isn't the case here. Lets start with your job title as a "Machine Operator" on the application ****Machine Operator
Tends to a group blow molding machines that processes plastic containers. 

Responsbile for visual and systemic quality checks. 

Makes mechanical adjustments to equipment.

Takes initiative to reach department/company goals including safety, quality and reliability. **** 

Is what is listed for requirements to fill the position. Little do they tell you these mechanical adjustments are what maintenance staff should take care of but typically do not have the time to address so there for you have poor reliability and a ton of down time because their machines are constantly falling apart. Like any other machine you have to do PREVENTIVE MAINTENANCE on them for them to run. The turn over rate at this place is exceptionally high, Poor management and bad attitudes would be my guess at why. You have people that really work hard but then you have the ones always on their phone not doing their job while the other guy does it for them and then when it's time for your evaluation you get a score that the guy that stayed on his phone got, so why continue to try when Clicky Fingers Mgee takes 1 hour breaks and is no where to found. There is a lot of favoritism here also.

The hardest part of this job would be doing someone else's job.

The most enjoyable part of this job is when I walk out. 

Your co-workers typically are nowhere to found.

Management is a JOKE! 

Really high deductible and poor coverage.

Lastly no time and a half only straight pay.

I've been with the company for nearly a decade(my mistake). Management hasn't a clue what the jobs on the floor actually entail and are all too willing to continually add to the workload of production associates without any financial consideration. They are constantly hiring for a reason and now most new hires are making the same or nearly the same as people on the floor who have been there 5 years or more. Good workers are leaned on to the breaking point and less than motivated employees are allowed to get by doing the bare minimum or less. The concept of the machine operator job is straight forward and not difficult but the redundant busy work, and the removal of support staff, has made the job and working conditions untenable if you are one of the few who are still trying to honestly perform all of the job responsibilites as they are supposed to be performed. Take a lower paying job at a better company and save yourself the frustration and stress. The management here will attempt to gaslight you into believing that you are lazy and whining if you complain or that you "lack vision" or "don't share their goals" if you're unwilling to take over another person's job and skip most of your breaks on a 12 hour shift for no additional pay. They will say that we are still perfectly able to take our breaks but they won't mention, or maybe the don't notice that, in taking your breaks, you will put yourself further and further behind quality checks to the point where you start skipping them all together like most other associates already do/always have done.

Its an easy job, nobody bothers you if you can manage to show up most of the time you can keep it. Alot of overtime available for those who are motivated notvso good part is your on a rotating schedule and when your picking up alot of shifts its alot to keep up with. Also they dont pay time and a half after 40 which i think is insane they have a strange "salary" based pay scale and when you work over you only get straight time. I myself temp there and get my time and a half the hired in guys make less then i do with my overtime. If your looking to do pretty much a straight 40hr week this might be the perfect place for you. If your like me grinding for every hundred dollar bill you can get you might want to go elsewhere. They have on call days once or twice each month you are scheduled to work you may be expected to work holidays without much if any incentive. A greedy billionaire owns this and a handful of other companys that are all connected to handle different aspects of the overall business. My advice would be to use this place as a stepping stone thru a temp agency if your needing a job and then bail when you find something better. If your even a half a half a decent enployee they will probably let you stay. Alot of the temps and even hired employees arent the sharpest. Which is another complaint it seems they'll give just about anybody a chance. If you need a job id reccomend it but i wouldnt plan on getting comfortable get in make some money and find something better...

It has been a few years since I was there, so I do not know if things have changed. But when I was there it was stressful because of the lack of proper procedures in place to be effectively efficient. There were times when very vague instructions would be given about a process because management usually was figuring things out by trial and error alot.  But they would be disrespectful or rude at times with employees about the instructions or thier own process that they had on place when things would not work or there was discrepancies from following instructions given by managers. On occasion If you as an employee found an more efficient way of doing things on your own and you presented your idea to management your idea would be used and implemented into thier procedures but "without" a thanks or reward or advancement from temp to permanent employment in which they dragged along past the 90 day period on most employees. They had employees there working there as temps who desired to be permanent employees for over 3 to 4 years without hiring them permanent.  There were employees still there from 30 to 20 years ago that weren't retiring anytime soon. So the room for advancement was very slim.

Work-life balance
There are so many different supervisors with different ideas of what is and is not okay so there is a lot of drama. And time off is unbalanced.

Pay & benefits
Great benefits, pretty good pay. But they don’t give you raises based on skill, you only get a raise if you ask for it.

Job security and advancement
There is growth and training opportunities and it is a positive thing. But if ever I needed training further than things I could learn myself, then I was out of luck.

Management
Management does not communicate important points but communicate well when it comes to gossiping which can jeopardize moral and job security.

Culture
It is nice not to be micromanaged but culture also forces you to beg for recognition if you are have positive or negative experiences, it is hard to get things acknowledged.

Overall
Good pay, benefits, and general rules. But bad practice within the plant when leadership is given discretion, for example when you need to tell HR personal business, they do not keep things confidential and no one thinks there is anything wrong with that. Just basics that for such a big company, should not be an issue. And these things can really negatively impact your work experience.

I honestly cannot think of a single positive thing to say about this company and how it treats its employees. You are expected to do the jobs of multiple people because there turnover rate is so bad they can't keep good new people. If you become sick or medically unable to work don't expect to have a job that long because they just don't care. They give an initial appearance of kind and caring but after your training and working on your own, you are nothing but a number to them. Most management has never worked the floor so they don't know whats going on or what it's like. You are expected to buy your own tools which is not stated in the initial job description or in your first days of training and then you are suppose to use those tools that you buy to fix there machines, that are constantly falling apart and breaking. There is a maintenance department but don't expect much from them they won't do anything unless its a serious issue, if its a small thing they expect you to fix it even though you have no training or knowledge on the inner workings of the machine. I wOnDer WHy tHeSe maCHinEs KeEp bREaKinG? Do I recommed this place to anyone? Just simply no, I would not wish this place on my worst enemy

What is the best part of working at the company?
The best part of working for Plastipak is their dedication to safety, community/charitable work, and medical benefits. 

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
The most stressful part of working at Plastipak is the ability to be well trained and/or train others to manage a line while also keeping it running. Training an individual who is not familiar with operating a palletizer, strapper, etc takes time and patience. Leads/peers tend to “hurry and fix the problem” to avoid downtime, resulting in the new associate not watching the process and learning to troubleshoot for themselves. 

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
Extremely negative. Many people are miserable and bring that misery to work with them. Or let their sullen attitude bring everyone else down and create unnecessary, negative energy. 

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
Pre shift meeting, reporting to the line to relieve the previous shift, communicate any machine related issues, maintain/troubleshoot your line for the 12 hour shift.

Hr is no real help, they keep people on because they say they need people then fire the hardest workers because of injuries or because they don’t like them. If the head of hr doesn’t like you they dont let you advance and good luck advancing anyway the way they need people they keep them where they’re hired, feels like a great place at first and then you realize exactly how bad it really is. hr promises so much and then blames only you for everything if you get hurt it’s automatically your fault and if it wasn’t they’ll spin it in a meeting to make it your fault. co workers very nice but they all hate their jobs and all secretly talk about a mass quit. Not a good place no matter how many people we get they all seem to leave and the ones that don’t are fired, good hard workers fired and people who sleep and stand around the whole shift doing nothing get to stay. Very hard work and still treated like a bottom feeder. Seen people leave the machines for hours to go off talking to people and still stay but people who won’t even go to the bathroom because they care too much get fired. 

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Forklift operator 91 salaries reported	$20.00 per hour
Machine operator 52 salaries reported	$19.33 per hour
Maintenance technician 83 salaries reported	$28.45 per hour
Production technician 63 salaries reported	$21.18 per hour
Process technician 37 salaries reported	$20.79 per hour

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