Umicore

Very busy atmosphere. Learned more about 5 s and Lean manufacturing, Leadership skills. The Co- workers are all team oriented and work well together. The hardest part of my job was getting proper answers to questions in a timely manner to do my job more efficiently. The most enjoyable and rewarding part of my job was the Amount of quality work my shift produced by inexperienced operators. I had trained all the guys and made them all team players that would do anything within reason and safety to acomplish our nightly goals and assignments. That to me was the most enjoyable and rewarding experience I could have. That was what drove me harder and made me work harder for Umicore. Satisfying Umicores needs and customers needs made me feel inspired and was a very enjoyable experience to see everything that was acomplished by the guys.

Umicore fails to keep a competitive pay compared to similar companies. They have had ,on more than one occasion, not given any cost of living or merit raises. They have laid off, or had multiple people quit ( due to poor management and pay ) that has made them hire new managers that still have no clue what they are doing. Rising up the ladder is impossible unless you are from Belgium. When you bring up these problems you are basically told to take a hike. Due to high turnover rate (caused by low pay and 12 hour shifts) you are constantly taking on more responsibilities/jobs without receiving compensation. You will be asked to work on the major holidays. You will be under constant stress if you work for Umicore.
With all that being said, I will move on to the pros. The benefits are decent, but they are getting worse every year. The building is a comfortable temperature to work in.

In conclusion, I would not recommend that you apply to Umicore. Similar companies offer a much higher pay with similar benefits. 

Umicore has been a great company to work for. The environment is pretty laid back and although some of the management will consistently follow up with you to get answers on questions you don't ever feel like someone is breathing over your shoulder. 

The company is very forward thinking and is doing a lot of things to help out the environment and the economy including being one of the biggest recyclers in the world. 

Being able to communicate with employees across the globe has been a very unique experience and you get to see how business is conducted in different parts of the world. 

The one negative in my opinion would be pay. Although the company offers very good benefits I do feel like the pay is a little bit less than what the market value of some people should be. 

Overall the company is very solid and you would be able to have a profitable career if you stayed long term.

Management fails to do their homework when positioning individuals in roles. Secrecy among leadership and management. Politics within the HR department Friendships. Company "values" are non-existent for "special employees"  Unwilling to consider improvements because the employees resist change and management are part of the problem. Failure to utilize skilled employees to full capacity. Very little room for growth unless certain people approve of you.  Expectations are if you treat me as God, I'll consider you. Witnessed dishonest employees being supported by upper management. Again, HR is the biggest issue, so favoritism to "friends".

What is the best part of working at the company?
Good benefits, bad management. Layoffs are constant and management is clueless. If you are not Belgian, forget about growth opportunities as this is a Belgian company.

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
Constant layoffs mean you are expected to absorb other positions with no raise in pay. Upper management and leadership is toxic and clueless.

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
Toxic and stressful. Umicore does not believe on their key values: openness, trust, etc. they are just words on a wall.

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
No resources to do the job. Constant stress and feeling undervalued.

•	On-site planning and implementation support of the Windows 7/Office 2013 migration for the North American Region of Umicore, Inc.
•	Provide technical solutions and troubleshooting for hardware and software support for North and South Eastern U.S. Umicore sites
•	Active Directory Administration, including user account creation/ changes, troubleshooting basic server performance and network connectivity issues
•	Asset management, from purchase through decommission of hardware
•	Lead migration project for Microsoft and Apple Operating systems, and MS Office products
•	Author documentation, as well as provide training for new hardware and software products across the Enterprise

Not much support on lots of different equipment with little support. Training is minimal. If you are able to figure things out alone then the field technician are good to work with. Danish based company with Danish equipment and drawings. Troubleshooting process, switches, transmitters, ph meters, O2 analyzers is the easier part. Hardest part is Troubleshooting calciner plc's, transport and transport plc, corrigation machines and robots are a mess to work on with lots of different equipment with limited support because there is limited information on them. Call outs are bad. Operations and maintenance technicians are great to work with.

Upper management a joke. More you do the more they tell you they pay you too much.  No advancement for hard workers. Benefits worse each year. Who knows how long place will stay open.  Place seems like it’s limping along until they close down.  Shifts that did the minimal rewarded while the shift that handled there work got more and more work load.  Overall just not a good work environment. On call every day and night of long change with no compensation, if you’re supervisor you don’t have to answer and they screw the operator.  If you op and don’t answer get written up. 

Overall, Umicore is a good company to work with. I was downsized due to a market down turn. I worked in the Ge substrates area, Quapaw, OK. There was a loss of market share due to a flood of inexpensive, cheap Chinese made semiconductors. The company did not easliy make the choice to lay off as many of us as they did, and held us on as long as possible in hopes the trend would reverse.

Pay was okay for the area but the benefits provided were above the norm for most companies. An ethical company.

Umicore is a dead end job.  The facility is very run down. Management holds the employees in very low regard unless you have a college degree. You can do your best or very worst, they don't think any more of you either way. Operators here are treated very differently than the rest of the plant. They can be expected to work every holiday, even Christmas, but you won't see any other employees on holidays!

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