A Great Place to work. Just don't make a mistake...EVER - Generalist McMaster-Carr Employee Review

2.0
21 Feb 2014
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Salary and benefits are amazing. Beautiful work campus. Numerous perks. Excellent training program.

Cons

Work environment is designed based on the Harvard Business School model. The pay and benefits are second to none but there is absolutely no margin for error. For the customer contact center, the reps are not allowed to have more than two entry errors per month. I took between 100-120 called a day in rapid succession. This company prides itself on it's absurdly high turnover rate and it rare to see an employee that has been there more than five years. Also, unless you have an Ivy League degree, do not expect to move into any supervisory position. To be fair, this is made very clear in the job interview. The reality is that your supervisor will be in their early 20's and just graduated from Harvard. They stay until they are weeded out or use the experience to launch their career with another company. The environment at the management level is cutthroat and hostile.

Explore other reviews about McMaster-Carr

4.0
16 Jun 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

- Pay/benefits are incredibly generous - People are generally easy/nice to work with - Note that the Systems department seems to be fairly isolated from the negative issues discussed in other reviews (e.g. tension between warehouse workers and management) - I haven't experienced any of those issues within the systems department. In my opinion, Systems is a great place to work and develop as an engineer. - Hybrid work style (3 days in office). Personally, I like hybrid more than both fully in-office and fully remote styles. - Great cafeteria with good food and cheap prices. - Good work/life balance (outside of being on call, I can leave work at work).

Cons

- Work is not super interesting to me. I come from a highly technical, but very different (not ecommerce/industrial supplies), background where I was doing work I was much more interested in. No doubt there are folks in Systems who love the domain though. - While I'm not on call a ton (1-2 weeks every few months), I really hate being on call. I like to leave work at work. Note that joining at least one reliability team is expected within your first year or so.

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