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Inside SAIC
An anonymous reader submits this profile of SAIC, Science Applications International Corporation, the behemoth defense contractor/research outfit/spymaster.
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I work for an employee-owned company that is modeled after SAIC, and it is pretty cool. You can clearly see that your work is contributing to the success of the company, which is driving the growth of the stock value, which is putting money in your pocket. And we attract a lot of top-notch people because of that.
If you didn't read too far into the article you might get the wrong impression, though. Twice on the first page they say that it's privately held, and it's only on the second page where employee ownership is discussed.
The "invisible company" angle of this article cracks me up. Seems like you can't swing a dead cat without hitting an SAIC employee. Everyone knows about them. They're everywhere. Finding a person who hadn't heard of SAIC would about as easy as finding someone who hasn't heard of Microsoft. But I guess that's just my world. Good article, tho.
BTW, if you are a java programmer in the DC area interested in doing defense work with a great company, send me your resume.
"I don't know half of you half as well as I should like, and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve."
I for one have never heard of this company before today and I'm pretty shocked. I've been pretty vocal about worries on TIA issues, but geeze...
On the other hand perhaps it was better "before" when we the people didn't know about everything and just believed blindly in our government to protect us.
SAIC will always be a private company. FYI, they don't even allow people outside the company to own stock. While you work there you are awarded pieces of the company as part of your compensation (beats the hell outta options, IMO), but when you leave you're forced to liquidate all your holdings in the company. Given the extremely sensitive nature of their line of work I'll bet this policy will never change.
-A.M.
Pimpin' all the Karma Hoes!
I work for SAIC, and employee ownership is pretty kickass, and the long list of "cool shit" that we do keeps getting larger and larger. My favorite part by far is that since everyone is an owner, the "retard rate" is alot lower - that guy slacking off is costing you money, so everyone busts ass.
The company is VERY conservative, lots of ex-military folks, but even conservative companies understand saving money, so at our division Open Source reigns supreme.
At our office we use Redhat, Debian, PostgreSQL, Bugzilla, and CVS almost exclusively. We all have linux desktops and laptops, even though the "corporate standard" is Exchange. We can get away with this because SAIC acts more like a cluster of tiny companies rather than a monolith. As long as we remain profitable, we can really do almost what we want.
My boss donates space to the local LUG at night to hold meetings, because they recognize the value of fostering professional development, AND it gives them a nice steady hiring pool.
If you ever have a chance to interview for SAIC then do it.
After reading the article through two or three times, I can certainly say it's interesting. What is REALLY interesting though is the message embedded in the article. Didn't expect that, did you?
Seriously, check it out. ROT13 the article, then drop every other character. Finally, use the alphabet backwards starting a S for one char, then A for the next, I for the next, C for the next, and repeat.
VERY clever. The message is certainly worth the effort decrypting.
KIKOMANVery strange indeed, having to worry about your job all the time.
I have found that the best way, when you find yourself in a difficult situation such as this, to secure your job is to kill anyone that has similar skillsets to you. That way you're always the go-to guy. The downside being that you can never sell your house and you have to make up excuses for your unnaturally gree grass all the time.