A terrible place to work, unless you're management tracked - Regular Employee McMaster-Carr Employee Review

2.0
31 Jul 2009
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Good pay, solid benefits, a (very) standardized schedule (for instance, NEVER weekends, overtime, etc)

Cons

Unless you are a management trainee you have zero chance of becoming anything worthwhile with this company. You could have a degree from a great school with a genius level IQ and you will be overlooked for every opportunity just because they are locked into whoever they recruit from alledgedly good schools. I understand a company's desire to recruit and train but its absurd that such a line is drawn that there is zero opportunity for advancement by anyone else within the organization. In fact, it is a terrible way to do business. The company is really an enigma because even the young managers seem to bail out after short time. Basically, this company sucks to work for, unless you are dumb enough to do the same thing over and over each day for what is good pay, honestly. But anyone with an IQ above their blood temperature should look elsewhere, in fact, run for the hills. This company could be something so much better if they developed a stronger team environment from top to bottom. Unfortunately many of the young managers have not evolved from their cliquish high school mentality. Good riddance!

Explore other reviews about McMaster-Carr

5.0
7 Jun 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Salary, benefits, coworkers, work/life balance

Cons

micromanagement at every level and job is boring at times

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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