Throughout my time with Holder I've noticed that this company is quick to hire young engineers right out of college because they know that they are more apt to work the demanding 12 to 14+ hr days needed for these projects. This is typical for a construction company but the management positions are often filled by inexperienced engineers who have no training or knowledge on how to manage a team which causes a lot of internal conflicts.
My experiences as a minority female engineer have been daunting and stressful during my tenure. The ironic thing is that the subcontractors treated me with more respect than my actual company. I can attest to having multiple meetings with team members when it comes to professionalism and having a safe working environment.
The overall culture is to get projects done and beat deadlines. However, there were no guidelines or standards on how to work effectively in most cases so you had to depend on the management team for your project. They often throw you on projects and expect you to handle the load no matter what but are easy to put the blame on you if something goes wrong. So having to deal with that along with being a female engineer was quite frustrating and impacted my personal life.
I can attest that during my time I've had about 4 managers quit during projects which made the work load even harder. This is a true statement that they do not value work-life balance and if you aren't ready to put in the work (long hours and weekends) then this company is not for you.
I can only hope that engineers can look outside of how much they get paid by this company and realize that there are other opportunities elsewhere that are "less stressful" with the same amount of money or that they take advantage of these complex projects and start their own company instead of working tirelessly for a company that will turn on you in a hot second.
