Great Place for a New Engineer to Start
Pros
POWER is a small company (~2000 people) and this translates into a comfortable work environment. Shorts and sandals are acceptable in the Houston office, hours are flexible, and there is a beer fridge in the kitchen. Health benefits are exceptional ($1000 Family Deductible) and include vision and dental. POWER as a company will do everything possible to keep you happy and productive. As a fresh grad you will get lots of experience in many different area's, most of which where not covered in school, and there is an infinite amount of room to grow.
Cons
Pay: Expect to be paid the going rate for a new grad engineer working in the design field. You can earn a few more dollars/hr doing the same job with someone else but POWER as a company makes up for the low cash compensation with the awesome health benefits, 401k matching, and 3 weeks of PTO in the first year. If you want to make more than 60k right out of school then find something besides design firms. Management: Management will not address the leadership issues within teams. The team lead is running off talent left and right, not because he is a bad engineer but because he is a poor leader. Protesting the micro-managing, the misguidance, and the being thrown under the bus is futile because the inner circle watches out for one another. The good engineers leave for other jobs while the mediocre engineers hang around and get promoted. For the few decent engineers (or drafters) who decide to stick with POWER but are not part of the "in crowd", they are paid less than new hires. Management is salaried PLUS year-end bonus, their end game is to squeeze everyone to boost that bottom line but contribute nothing productive to the team.
