| Category | Rating |
|---|
| Pay | -3 |
| Respect | -4 |
| Benefits | -4 |
| Job Security | -2 |
| Work/Life Balance | -2 |
| Career Potential/Growth | -4 |
| Location | -3 |
| Co-worker Competence | -4 |
| Work Environment | -5 |
As a recent college graduate, I was lucky enough to actually get a job. However after working here for about a year, I realized that there are so many problems that exist with this company.
One of the major problems is the tension between the salaried employees and unionized workers. The union essentially set up a bunch of unnecessary rules that make it hard to get work done efficiently. The unionized workers are paid hourly, so they have no incentive to get products built on time. Because of the hourly pay, they work slowly, because they know salaried people are not suppose to touch production material. The union also works on seniority, so should there ever be any layoffs for the union, the newest ones are the ones to go. It doesn’t give new assemblers any incentive to work hard. There is also infighting between the union workers of different buildings, because one building assembles faster than the other. Their slow working actually costs the company future contracts, which would decrease work for the union, which would only let go of the new assemblers. Also because they are unionized, they demand high salaries, they make more than technicians who do the same work. I’m surprised the head of the MS2 in Syracuse did not try to break the union during the recession. They could easily outsource the work to another Lockheed site where their union is not as demanding.
There are so many inefficiencies in the process at Lockheed. Any experienced engineer should be able to make their own schematic or solid model drawings, but at this company theres a long process to get the changes done a drawing, it’s a waste of time and money. They have an old unix system and database for tracking equipment and products. Its so old, it doesn’t recognize a mouse input, and only accepts keyboard inputs. It can’t import anything from excel, so sometimes things have to be manually inputted, one at a time. Some of the software used by the company, made by the company, are not user friendly, and poorly developed. A majority of the work is paper pushing, it is very hard to get any real work done and not many people enjoy it there.
The atmosphere is very tense, it’s all a political game. People are afraid of doing things differently unless theres someone to blame incase it goes wrong. Some are trying to climb the corporate ladder, always looking for the promotion or the next big step. Based on my time there, program managers are not very competent about the actual engineering, they make schedules that are not realistic, and it backfires on them. Theres a huge flaw in communication style of managers and leads. Team leads do not set good examples, nor do they inspire new engineers. Some people just complete their 40 hours regardless of how much work gets done or if they meet their milestones or schedule. Others who work greater than 60 hours a week sometimes do not get raises because their functional managers do not fight for the raises. Its all about who you know and how much they like you.
The rules set up by the company makes it hard for employees to socialize with each other. People walk the hallways, sometimes with their head bowed because they don’t like being there. A lot of people are frustrated with how poorly the place is run, but can’t do anything to change it, and can’t quit because they need the job. As for the pay, I would’ve gotten paid more in a better city if the company I worked for didn’t have a hiring freeze.
The company itself is very hypocritical, it preaches on ‘doing the right thing’ but when it comes time for the company to do the right thing when it comes to supporting its employees it doesn’t. They have decreased benefits, new employees no longer have a pension benefit, the healthcare is crap, layoffs just occurred. The company does not show its support for the employees, it just uses them for free publicity. Case in point, the Tour de Cure bicycling team does not receive any support, ie entry fees, cycling jerseys, from the company but they use the company name in the fund-raising and raise the most in the Central New York area.