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Southland Industries

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Southland Industries reviews

Do not join the IT department in any capacity - Anonymous employee Southland Industries Employee Review

1.0
Jan 2, 2018
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

These comments are from the perspective of a member of the IT department and are likely drastically different than those you might see from the business-side of things. The business itself is pretty great over all, but the IT department has turned into a mess of a show and I would not recommend any soul join the IT team unless you're looking for something short term and can handle stress and unfortunate nepotism. - Bleeding edge infrastructure and applications. The hardware used both server and client side are all really great pieces of technology. The business invests into these areas and it really shows in its great infrastructure performance. - Extremely talented IT members. We had some really smart people! I always felt like I was learning something new through my years with the company. - Business-sided employees are friendly. - Great benefits. Some of the best around in terms of 401k and HSA; that said, the health insurance was recently changed and is not as great as it used to be. The employees are honestly the best part of working at Southland. It's just too bad the IT department is now run so poorly.

Cons

- Temp-to-hire IT contractors are lead to believe they have a chance at a full time position. This is seemingly untrue and I feel terrible for anyone accepting a contract under this premise. From everything I saw, you will likely NOT be hired full time under the company if you join as a contractor under any of the IT departments; I can't think of any exceptions based on the many conversations I had with people who left, but I suppose it is possible some exist. - Extremely high IT turnover rate for both contractor and full time positions in all IT departments. Many lasted only a few days to a few weeks. Members of the technology support department are the greatest casualties in this regard. The technology support manager can be a brutal micro-manager and I feel it leads to really poor team morale. - I felt I was unofficially expected to be available to work 24/7. - CIO seems to hire mostly friends for managerial and leadership positions. - IT leadership strongly believes that "anyone is replaceable" (this is voiced in other reviews on here as well). - The IT team is now a skeleton crew, riddled with non-stop emergencies as the most talented senior members flee to companies who might care about them. At its heart, Southland was a fantastic company to work for in the IT department. They used to be comfortable investing in infrastructure and employees and everyone was so much happier for it. Unfortunately the last few years have suffered greatly due to changes in IT leadership who will do anything to save pennies, and it is only a matter of time before these poor decisions are ultimately reflected in the business' bottom line. Naturally everything in my review is only a statement of my opinion based on my experiences with the company, but honestly, if you had the sense to look up this review and have aspirations to have a fulfilling position in IT, you're too good for this company and you owe it to yourself to find any job elsewhere. It makes me sad, but I cannot recommend joining them.

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Southland Industries Response
8y
Thank you for taking the time to express yourself. We sincerely appreciate the candid feedback and on many of your points, we are in agreement: • Southland is a great company; our business people are excellent to work with. • We have consistently invested in progressive infrastructure and applications to maintain our position; we invest based on business need. Most recently implementing VDI technology to better support the expanding business. • We have a skilled, talented and high performing IT team including employees, contractors, and vendor partners. • Our IT team is highly regarded within the business; we are in the center of developing leading edge technology with our engineering and operations team. We do recognize that individual perspectives can vary greatly so I would like to highlight: • Southland has significantly increased IT investment 25-30% year over year including an investment in increasing our IT employee levels 30% over the last three years. • We have continued to reward our employees with increasing wage levels and skill development through training and expanded opportunities in this very competitive marketplace. • We have great respect for our employees and the balance of work and home life; we have never asked for 24/7 availability. Our work hours are reasonable, flexible, and most importantly aligned with needs of the business. • We have seen manageable turnover in a very strong demand driven marketplace where, given our reputation, employees can typically move readily. • We have increased both outside and contract employee levels given additional workload and increasing complexity of technology while promoting from within our team. We believe we have made good decisions balancing promoting from within against hiring additional needed outside expertise. We have also successfully converted contractors to employees where there was a good fit on both sides. I wish you had come to see me with your concerns when you worked here. I invite you to reach out to me to discuss them so that the IT leadership team can continue to improve the work environment for our employees. Linda Smart Chief Information Officer

Explore other reviews about Southland Industries

5.0
Jul 22, 2026
Intern
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Good company culture, competitive pay, opportunity to grow and learn, internship program is excellent, project engineers learn a ton quickly

Cons

As an intern, I don't have any negative comments.

1.0
Jun 20, 2026
Industrial pipefitter
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

7-12s, a few good people.

Cons

Supervisor stood and wouldn’t let us leave till exactly 12:00 and wanted us back with tools in our hands at the exact second lunch was over. Management made bad decisions and had to stand on man lift handrails to WALK on pipe with nothing below us. Too cheap to rent a crane needed to make lifts with telehandler at max capacity and max radius. Had 300 people on site and a lunch tent built to hold 50 which is fine but prohibited any food or drink inside the building. Had to take lunch outside in the sun without shade in the Texas summer. No ice to keep water cool, wouldn’t buy even a tarp or umbrella while working on the roof with white vinyl reflecting light back up at you. This was a union job and this is single-handedly the worst experience I’ve ever had. Started non union and was treated worse on this job than on any other job in my 20 year career. Get this they fired a dead guy. Never even bothered to check on him or call his family. Man died in an accident and obviously didn’t show for 2 days. Called the hall to find a replacement and found out he had died. Tore up the paperwork and changed his status to hide that they’d fired him. Some of the most incompetent leadership (calling them that is a joke) I’ve ever seen.

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