Hot-Shot Civil Engineering Firms 3

[cah2oeng]

I know in many professions, such as Accounting, Finance, or Marketing, there are the "Big Firms" that pretty much hire the best of the best (Deloitte & Touche, Accenture, Proctor & Gamble, etc...). Many of those jobs are considered prestigious by their peers, and slouches typically need not apply.

My question is, are there any equivalently "prestigious" engineering jobs out there? In other words, if you run into a guy at a conference and he works for XXXXX, do you say to yourself, "that guy is probably pretty sharp if he works for them."?

Curious to hear some insight on firm reputations. Thanks!

 

[whyun]

In the structural arena, there are large firms who has large projects on their hands. Large doesn't quite equate to prestigious, however.

I've seen many sharp engineers from small consulting firms and many not-so-sharp ones from large firms. At least in the structural arena, in my opinion, people will not generally assume someone is sharp because he/she belongs to a so-called prestigious firm.

Other engineering disciplines may be different...

 

[bioengr82]

To my knowledge, there is no correlation between firm and quality of employee. In fact, in my region, the best/brightest tend to leave existing firms and form their own small consultation businesses. Obviously the larger firms get the larger projects, however, I do not believe this extends to quality of employee.

 

[stanier]

If its names of companies who are in the premier division surely the likes of Bechtel, Fluor, Kvaerner would have to be up there. But that may be just on the size of job that they can undertake & their standards rather than the competence of the individuals who work there.

The same can be said of accountancy companies and others. Surely the issues at Arthur Anderson, Enron, Tyco, Lloyds etc are still fresh in our minds.

Larger companies generally have invested in systems and procedures and the work is routine rather than innovative. That's not to say that the engineering isnt first class.

The larger oil companies have a reputation of employing good people in that they pay well and thus have a competitive edge as to who they select. But even they tend to go for the good quality steady person rather than the entrepreneur. These companies have set procedures that do not allow people to fail.

 

[LHA]

In the civil field in PA, USA:

There is no correlation. All firms large and small have competent and incompetent people in design, field and administration. It is very hard for those who excel to single out their accomplishments, because the whole design team gets credit (or blame) for a resulting project.

The competent tend to move around a lot, due to the fact that they can keep commanding better compensation than their current bosses want to give. It is very common for the best to not only leave a company for better compensation package, but to then return to the former company; because the former company will now give that person the compensation they had previously refused to provide, once that competent person demonstrates he or she can command it elsewhere.

Finally, many of the most competent tend to start their own firms, which the larger companies then buy out, further blurring the lines of where the best people work. I have a surveyor friend who left a company, started his own firm, then sold it back to his former boss. That is not unheard of.

Remember: The Chinese ideogram for “crisis” is comprised of the characters for “danger” and “opportunity.”
-Steve

 

[whyun]

In my experience, the best firm to work for paid very little. Not-so-good firms to work for tended to pay rather well.

By best firms to work for, I mean the following:
1) competent staff (overall)
2) well established set of company standards
3) main boss typically is the founder
4) room to grow professionally
5) have opportunity to learn new things

Firms where the founder has either retired or sold to the best of his disciples have a tendency to go down in quality, although there are exceptions.

Someone making the dream salary is not necessarily the smartest.

Highly technical staff who put down their managers or marketing people are usually right but often they ignore the skills that their managers have that they don't. Some managers have "it" but many don't. Maybe they just got lucky...

 

[queque]

If a sharp preson leaves a firm and starts a successful business? how does he find out what his firm can be sold for?
Who does he consult to determine the true value?

 

[whyun]

One can not determine how much a firm is worth until there is an established client base and a backlog of work. Firm taking over will weigh the liability and the potential income from the client base and the backlog before making the acquisition.

 

[cah2oeng]

Those last two questions would probably elicit a good response in the "Starting and Running an Engineering Business" forum on this site.