crew member

maintenance technician

operator

electrician

production worker

Universal Stainless

This company, or at least the North Jackson plant, is a sinking ship. The management is terrible for the most part. They don’t care about the employees at all. All they are concerned about is having the machinery run and disciplining employees. There are many cameras all over and they are not used for “safety” like they said. They are used to manage and discipline. That’s it. As a matter of fact they are in the process of adding dozens more right now. The management sticks it’s finger into every aspect of the plant, but has little to no knowledge when it comes to the day to day work. They manage by intimidation and no one in the “middle management “ will dare disagree no matter how idiotic the ideas are. Nothing is repaired correctly because they just want to keep everything running, therefore most repairs are “band-aided”. Actually most thing can’t be repaired correctly because there are never the correct parts anyway. Either they were ordered incorrectly or they aren’t ordered at all. Just make it work with wrong parts. There is almost no ventilation in the Forge building and there is a cloud of metal dust constantly lingering in the air. Everything is covered in this dust including the lungs of all affected employees. They did do an air survey test once, but they didn’t test anywhere out on the floor. They tested only in air conditioned areas. Not out where the air quality is dangerous. This has been brought up multiple times, but nothing has been done. The pay is terrible for the amount of work required. In maintenance, they basically want master electricians, mechanics, and welders all rolled into one, but pay only around $20 per hour. 
 
 I would not recommend this job to my worst enemy.

I worked there for 10 years, learned every job in my department, did it mean I would make more money ? It should have, I never received my proper raises and the Union did absolutely nothing about it but lie to my face. Do yourself a big favor and stay away from this place! There’s not much good to say about it. Work is dangerous with very very outdated machines. Management and the company only care about collecting their big bonuses and not with reinvesting in the place. The plant is Bridgeville is horrible. Especially the blooming mill. When we were brokedown, we would just sleep until we were ready to start rolling steel again. Which would sometimes be days. When it snowed and the water lines froze up, no one bothered to call us and tell us, many times I risked my life driving to work for no reason and me and 1 other person were the only ones to show up. We didn’t get paid for it! If you are late even 1 minute on the holiday  (even if there’s a massive wreck on 79, which happened a few times) you won’t  be paid for the 2 day holiday which was the previous 2 days that we didn’t work. 50 some employees were late about 10 minutes because of a fatality on 79, none of us got paid for that 2 day holiday. The Union did nothing about it. The president is in the companies pocketbook. It’s sad. 

When you are told by the head of HR you are hired and she tells you when and where to go for your physical and drug testing you would assume they would want you to know what position you are being hired for, correct? When you ask her and her response is "We don't know", then you ask "When will you know?" and her response is "Probably before you start"...well, that is red flag of her/their ignorance and attitude of what you will have to deal with there. Other than her and Universal Stainless, what company hires people without telling them what they are being hired for? What person would take a job with no clue as to what they will be doing? Save your time and gas money, don't waste a minute on that place. For $12 an hour to do steel mill work, and that's for any position in the plant, that should make you think...they don't tell you how much they pay until you go there, interview and take their tests. You will also be taken on a tour of the plant, steel toe boots are mandatory, another thing she, the head of HR, never told me and I didn't find out until the supervisor came to take me on the tour. You will also work two weeks on and two weeks off, 12 hour shift work, so there's some helpful info for everyone if you decide to risk it.

Absolutely terrible place to work, new employees are treated like kings while the veteran employees are tossed aside. There isn't a single manager/supervisor who can perform their job or give direction without first consulting the "lord of the manor" plant manager. Who has the managing capabilites of a tyrant with the brain of a squirrel. The maintenance dept is a joke, maybe 2 guys there are decent. The rest complain about having to work or belittle employees because of their own inadequacies. The meltshop is an animal all its own. The union there is weak and most of the veteran workers who remain are company men who rat out their brothers or do favors for supervisors. The forge dept and maintenance are the Hotspot for this. Finishing is probably the best place to be, you can do minimal work and be left alone, except for the night turn supervisor who is as clueless as the day is long. All in all new employees have it pretty good, unlimited call offs without punishment, raises often. If you feel like riding out the sinking ship it could pay off.

What is the best part of working at the company?
Working at this company is chaos, it will certainly keep you busy and you will rarely be bored at work. 

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
The constant threatening of your job as means of motivation. Also, the really poor safety culture. You never know when an accident is about to happen and someone will get hurt which is very common in the plant. 

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
I would call it hostile at best. The GM of the plant manages people with intimidation and insults.  You are given no support or guidance from day one of the job, and when you make a mistake your job will be threatened rather than being offered help or any type of assistance. 

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
The day is usually stressful and exhausting.  The constant turnover of employees results very high work loads for the few people who stick around for more than a few months.

During my time at Universal Stainless, I found the work environment to be challenging and not ideal. Right after orientation, I was moved into various roles with little training or preparation, which made it difficult to perform efficiently. The facility itself is quite old and in need of repair, and it often felt uncomfortable due to poor conditions. There were also concerns about safety, as accidents seemed to happen regularly, and the workplace did not always feel secure.

The pay was lower than expected for the amount of effort required. The company also had high expectations for work hours, with long shifts and many days required each week. I felt the compensation did not match the demands of the job.

This is an extremely unstructured environment. There is no support from management to help you succeed in your job. It is up to you to solicit help from co-workers who won't help you. No feedback unless you do something wrong. People will communicate with you at that point to make sure you know it was your fautl. Asking questions to try to learn is apparently frowned upon. You are just supposed to "figure it out," despite the fact that you don't even have access to to systems, system features, files, etc. that you are supposed to have. 

Sprint from the start to the finish of each day with little time to plan. Poor utilization of human assets. I've learned that the development of people and strategic team building is key to success. Small staff of entrenched employees but very good at what they do. The most difficult part of the job is balancing crisis management. The most enjoyable part of my current job is never running out of challenges and serving a demanding customer base. Interfacing with customers in order to meet their various needs is very rewarding.

This place is terrible. They micromanage everything. You work 12 hours a day seven days a week. The pay is terrible! This mill is $6 below the national average on pay! Our union president is a pedophile and is pictured on megans law. As for the union, well its nonexistent due to our contract that has "company convenience" which pretty much means our union can't do jack and the company can do whatever it wants. We can't even strike because of our contract! This is the worst company you can ever work for. Its a dead end job with zero promotions. Yes that's right. They do not promote within. 45cents a year is the raise you get. They only can get convicts to work here because no normal person would. Don't waste your time here.

Most union guys are great to work with but to much upper management with different titles telling you how to do your job and want it done there way.  It just causes confusion and slows everything done.  Certain supervisors were great but unfortunately they don’t last,  you have to be a “yes” man to everything.  The job wasn’t hard just frustrating most times when your being told to do stuff from different supervisors who have no clue what they’re doing or what your job title is. The union is the only thing keeping a lot of good workers there.

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Crew member 27 salaries reported	$20.19 per hour
Maintenance technician 8 salaries reported	$28.62 per hour
Operator 2 salaries reported	$21.75 per hour
Electrician 5 salaries reported	$33.27 per hour
Production worker 2 salaries reported	$18.50 per hour

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