Pros
Good pay, benefits, opportunities to move around in the plant, overtime potential.
Cons
If you are anywhere between Operator 1 and Supervisor, they will ride you like a rented mule. Management demands more and more every day, and will crawl down your throat the very second something looks like it's not running well. Supervisors are ridden by the managers nearly as badly as the operators, and then take it out on the operators, who end up with so much extra work, plus the stress and demands of angry "Leadership position" people. Things just go downhill from there. In addition to that, they decide to try to run departments with less people than are minimally required to staff the lines. Supervisors don't help out when short handed, rarely call people for help, and still demand the same productivity and results. When half the crew couldn't get the work done in time, the operators get reamed. Complaints are never dealt with. Nothing changes. Scheduling is a joke. I have literally seen my department schedule change six times in one shift. Management knows, at minimum, what orders need to be run on Wednesday. Our work week runs Saturday thru Friday, so the schedules only show one week, ending on Friday. You never know if you work a Saturday until late Friday night, the night before. No asking if they can move your week around (because you're not allowed to have a life outside of those walls) and they unapologetically change your hours and demand you stay late at last second. If you tell them no, you are basically threatened with your job and told you'd be fired if you leave (walking out on the job.) The list goes on and on.