Shive-Hattery

IF, your dream job is, being treated like a child, after years of employment, no chance to advance, working for a company that is NOT ethical, doesn't care one bit about their employees, doesn't care about your personal life, doesn't follow the laws of the ADA, family medical leave act, and eventually let go, without being treated like previous employees, then this would be perfect.

If you are a woman, just smile at the Office Manager (Myron) and you will get whatever you want. Bigger company with multiple offices. None of them work together very well. None of them have the exact same rules. In one office, the office manager will let you get away with anything you want, while others, treat you horribly. The CEO (Tom Hayden) is an arrogant, self serving, fool. He thinks reading books on how to get more out of his employees, is the bible.

If you are considering accepting employment with this company, I strongly warn you to reconsider your options. They will be very nice at first, but once you sign on the bottom line, be prepared to over worked, under appreciated. They promote they are all about the advancement, through a "career path", but after you fill out that paper work, just throw it away, it will go nowhere. The company HR employees, do NOT care about you, they are just puppets for the CEO, even when they know what they do is illegal. The department leaders say they will always have your back, but when something comes up, they don't defend you, most likely because they are scared that there will be ramifications for themselves.

When you leave, and you will, be prepared to be "black balled" for the rest of your career. Very vindictive management. Dealing with management is like dealing with toddlers.

Overall S-H was good to employees, focusing the best treatment on younger staff with senior staff often seen as expendable.  For outsiders coming into the company, their seemed to be no plan or strategy in place to succeed.  You were often on your own.  It seemed a little cliquish in that respect.  

S-H needs to start planning for its future and while they dread it, they really should consider being bought by a bigger organization.  There would be growing pains but ultimately it would be better for younger staff and the company.  Their other option - while times are good financially, they need to step up their efforts to acquire other smaller firms.

They need to find ways to be innovative and not follow others, spending more time on acquiring and maintaining repeat clients and less time on marketing small jobs.  They spend too much time marketing work.  They need to at times team with other firms for bigger jobs.  

They need to listen to fresh ideas internally.  They also need to, at times, hire from outside the company for key management positions to get those fresh ideas.

I worked for Shive for less than 2 years. In that time I had assisted with many large projects, and helped secure clients. When work slowed however, I tried marketing. Nothing I was doing was working so I requested assistance. For 8 months I got nothing. Upper management would tell me that they would talk. Eventually I went to HR with my concerns. Three weeks later I was let go. Not a very reliable, comfortable, or overall safe environment to be working in. Would not recommend this company to businesses or people looking for a career.

Shive-Hattery is an employee focused company that encourages employees to grow in their professional careers both in depth of knowledge and breadth of skills.  Hours are reasonable but can get busy at times, as is typical of the industry.  They do compensate for overtime, even for salaried employees, which shows an appreciation for the added effort required at times to get good designs out the door.  The market sectors served are varied (government, industrial, commercial, education, higher ed, health care, etc), which makes for an interesting array of projects.

Had temp job drafter with aspirations of moving into their civil engineering department. Frustrating work with promise of advancement but instead its use and lose, watched 10 people turn over in my 8 months of working there. Encouragement of questioning and asking for help and then project managers get angry they can't answer your questions. No one wants to hear fresh ideas and team building is unheard of, stay silent, bang your head against your keyboard for 8 hours and go home. Rinse and repeat. Company is about 5 years behind relevant A&E firms.

Enjoyed the culture and the work environment. Breath of architectural projects seemed to be limited: education, multifamily, industrial. They ask you what 'career track' you want to be on, but if your 'senior' you better be bringing in work. Better negotiate very well up front because salary increases are a joke and no bonuses. Definitely a 'BIG E,  little A' firm - managed by short sighted engineers.  Night and day difference now that I'm with a great firm managed by architects.


Great opportunity to develop your skills inside the strength of a stable, strong company.  The culture really encourages teamwork and a teaching-learning mentality.  Its a medium size firm but management still knows everyone and their family.  They provide great flexibility to allow you to serve the needs of your family as well as your clients.

I worked with a group of other students. We would use the same programs the employees used. I connected with many architects who gave me jobs outside of my classroom time. Very helpful. They also had this great team building day where they made pictures of things out of Post-its on the glass walls.

Had a great experience overall working on different types of projects in the architecture and design sector.  My coworkers were very diverse and I learned a lot from them.  The management had some issues and did not communicate very well with staff.  

Staff is not appreciated by management.  I showed up to work everyday and did everything that was asked of me but never got one supportive word from the office manager.  The wage is not livable, especially if you are on one income.  When I asked for a raise, their response was to let me go instead.  

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