What's your experience interviewing externally?
The biggest shocker was externally, they hardly value my Shell experience. Having 2-decades of experience and they're sorting me off to 5 year experience jobs. People regard Shell experience as less than. Plus, they seem to have interviewed a bunch of other shell people and know things are bad at Shell. Offers are definitely lower than current salary.
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I came from the vendor side of things. People from the majors (not all) are not used to working with less support and increased deliverables. In my experience, it is a harder adjustment for people to step back from the majors as opposed to stepping up to them. Also, half the time you spend in vendor meetings, the “company man” often doesn’t know what they are talking about. This translates to less trust in the skills of the people who who actually can contribute.
I was at Shell for six years and I just got on with a small company. Managed to get a small pay bump out of it. I’m probably a weird case because I always had issues at Shell not accepting stuff that’s other people’s jobs onto my plate which made for a good resume. However, this week one of my new coworkers did mention he’s rarely impressed with Shell engineers.
Interviewed with smaller company as well. Ended up taking a small pay cut(3%), but on a higher bonus structure (25%). They valued my shell experience(13 years) and I’m working for a much more nimble company
Golden handcuffs ?
Shell still has a reputation for hiring good talent and putting them through a structured development process/competitive environment but most hiring managers in the industry know to be careful of hiring people who "get work done by others" or are in "technical assurance" "project management". They are looking for staff to bring clear value to the table and help build capability/deliver better not to hire on also rans/wanna be leaders/middle managers who love process and bureaucracy. Shell is definitely not known for executional excellence and moving fast while keeping costs low. Typical smaller operators value these mindsets a lot.
People believe that Shell folks are too siloed and not a fit to work in smaller companies because their experience is too limited to do the work of all. Shell doesn't generally make the required Jack of all trades.
It would be gratifying to have a current well paid job, except there is a date set when that ends unless I find an internal Shell job.
I interviewed for an external role and the smaller company gave feedback that they were relieved ‘I wasn’t too Shell’.
I think there is the perception that Shell develops arrogant and inefficient people that like meetings and workshops more than delivering real work.
Shell do pay well though, particularly compared to the current market.
If what you’ve done is confirm how well you’re paid for your current role and contribution, doesn’t that make you feel gratified to at least have a position at Shell?
There’s no perfect job out there. So I’d rather be well compensated and suffer some irritation than scrape by financially, frustrated that I’m not better paid for my daily grind.
If it was all supposed to be fun and games it’d be called “pleasure”, not “work”.
I tried to explain the un-employability of Shell staff developed in the last 20 years in operating unit.
When I’ve interviewed externally they valued my experience and said I clearly have expertise in my field. But they did not want to match my current compensation. This was with several smaller companies in our industry.