I recently started a job at a hospital that employees nearly 6,000 people. It is a major teaching hospital, the largest in this region and has 900 inpatient beds.
Just for background I’m an RN and my last job was at a hospital with 200 beds and the one before that had 300 beds, I’ll call them A and B.
I can’t get over how frigging huge this place is. There are 10 buildings with a huge cavernous tunnel that connects them all, miles of hallways, and untold specialty units. I don’t even want to talk about how far away the employees have to park on day shift. There are a fleet of security vehicles that run shuttle service. Hospitals A and B had general med surg floors, ICU/CCU plus the usual ER, OB, mental health etc.,and all patients were just sorted within those categories. Now there is a designated unit for nearly any ailment.
I went from being a biggish fish in a small pond to a minnow in an ocean. Talk about your culture shock.
Depending on projects, and staffing of International offices, between 7000 to 9000. But they are not all concentrated, like your example, so one would never know it.
Worldwide, about 250,000 employees. This location, about 4,000 (it was 13,000 when I started, and 45,000 during WW2).
Not that intimidating, really, and having the resources available when you need them really helps. You’ll find that you operate only within a subset of the company that is about the size of the companies most people work in.
Leeds General Infirmary has around 7000 staff but its part of a National Health System with around 3 million.
Now its the UK prisons service, 75000 of us and around 66000 criminals.
I worked for small companies and found they flouted safety, were not interested in training, paid shite pensions if at all, minimum number of holidays, crap wages and all on the justification that it was too expensive, boss’s son still had a Ferrari though, and at another the boss had a Rolls Royce.
Can’t say I ever knew of anyone personally who worked for a good small employer, they must be out there I suppose.
I just have to jump in here, casdave. I’ve owned a paint contracting business for 22 years (with three years off to drive a semi all over the US, just because I’d always wanted to do that!). Painting buildings may not be a high tech, professional job, and I’ve mostly paid [sub]cash, no bennies[/sub] to my workers. However I think I have wonderful employees. Seasonal workers come back each summer, & I have two women who’ve worked for me for six years. I pay well, give big bonuses when we really make a killing on a job by working extra hard, bought one painter a truck when she had her van stolen…we all work well together & I rely on them as much as they on me (if not more.) I’ve had anywhere from 1-15 workers at a time.
Going OT…just had to respond in defense of some of us little employers! (None of whom drive fancy cars that I know of, but I’m in construction after all. Hell, half of my workers drive nicer cars than I do.)
To the OP: Right now, me & 5 workers. I once joined the US Navy Reserves (Go Seabees Can Do!! :D). That was a rather large organization, IIRC! Also the shittiest pay and least organised I’ve ever been a part of. Trust me…your tax dollars are being seriously wasted there.
Flour Corporation, in Orange County California, once had a reported 10,970 employees working on a day to day basis from their, (at that time) headquarters.
Folks who made environmental impact studies for the area, determined that due to the impact on the 5 freeway, and neighboring streets, a staggered shift release was proper to minimize local disruption.
As a field engineer for Fluor during the '70s, my experience with the mass exodus syndrome was blessedly limited.
Rapid transit, car pooling, and the like, began to make sense to many.
I was a semi-competent, moderately well traveled cubical holder for several years. Home was only about 20 miles from the “compound.” Being “lost in the shuffle” caused me to search elsewhere for fame.
Corporate/company size is not necessarily a bad thing, but many search for a small measure of that notorious “15 minutes.”
Once upon a time I worked at Walt Disney World in Florida. I’m not sure if there were more than 5,000 employees there, but it sure felt like it.
Sometime before that I was a member of the US Army, I’m fairly sure there were more than 5,000 servicemembers in each unit I was assigned to before I got out.
Now I work for an IT company that, while it is nationwide, only has about 150 in the division that I work at. Kind of a nice thing to feel like I know a large number of the people I work with.
On the other end of the spectrum, I appear to be working for nobody on the job I’m currently doing. I found this temp job on my own, so the temp agency I’m being payrolled by takes no responsibility for me, and the company I’m actually working at hasn’t hired me, so they take no responsibility for me, and I’m not self-employed. Hmmm.
I used to have to go to the Pentagon every so often. Roughly 23,000 people work in that godawful building. I hated every trip there. It’s mind boggling.
Well, I think overall there are at least 10,000 people who work for the U. We’re like our own city–we’ve got everything but a jail. I’m not kidding–we have everything else. And the fact that is also a home for another 30,000 students means there are all kinds of of other things available to me. Of course, those 10,000 people are scattered across departments and buildings and such. My own little office houses about 15. It’s kind of a “best of both worlds” situation. Big-employer resources, small-office environment.
I worked (as a contractor) at the Pentagon, @23-25,000 people. The place is huge; you can’t imagine what it’s like to walk in there in the morning with thousands of people coming in the same doors at the same time.
I also worked (again, as a contractor) at SSA headquarters near Baltimore, 17,000 people. I think there are about 10 buildings. Many of them are linked by a long corridor on each floor, and if you don’t know your way around you can go from building to building and not know it. The “cubicle cities” in some of the areas at SSA are just immense.
Like Cranky’s U, Rutgers has over 10,000 employees but doesn’t feel crowded even though most of us are located in the central Jersey campuses. Nice community feel to it. That is, until 4:30, when most go home and Rtes 1, 18, and 27 become parking lots.
Just checked our interal phone book, some quick math resulted in nearly 6,000 employees distributed among about a dozen buildings within a half-mile radius. All of us should be in a central location on Duke Street one block south of King Street Metro come 2005, the site is currently under construction.
My little division has a just has a few dozen employees.
