Working at Lockheed Martin — Reviews by Employees

I worked in the tradeshow and model making area for 5 years as basically a grunt. Boring work. Because of the nature of the work I did see "Big Wigs" all the time. Some were OK but most were sucking the company dry with their salaries and positions. Most would be useless in a for profit business due to their lack of knowledge and the fact that most were ex Air Force and had been brought up as entitlement workers since their military days. The average worker,as I was , didn't factor in any achievement success, All success was awarded to the managers or higher ups. This place was so political. I saw bloated government waste daily. The average worker was well over 50 years old, sitting around waiting for their retirement. "Untouchables". Everyone else was always scooting around the layoff rumors. It's so hard to do a good job in an environment like that. Hard to plan a future. Good hard working employees were constantly shown the door.
My personal experience allowed me to gain insight into a large organization. I also learned that politics plays more of a role than personal performance. My director, head of an engineering department was hired through politics.... her background was a retired kindergarden teacher whose husband knew a politically connected executive. She was useless. My manager was inept and incompetent. He knew politics, that's all he knew. My lead was supposed to have a bachelors degree, I had one, he had a high school diploma at best. He knew politics and protected the manager. I knew more than my manager , I was a threat and that's why I was layed off. The attrition rate for top notch engineering students after 5 years was nearly 100%. They only higher the top 10% of graduates. These are smart people who know how to see through all the BS and writing on the wall. They get their MBA's and move on.

As a citizen it angers me that such waste is causing such a tax burden. The arrogance of the executive team and their lack of vision is shameful. The American public is not getting nearly the value for their tax dolllars as Lockheed Martin's PR suggests. I could go on and on but all the other posts suggest the same things.

I can sum it up in one statement.
Mismanagement - across the board...
This company will eventually fail due to its own corporate ego.LM has been doing government contracts so long that they have developed a corporate ego chip where they 110% think they know everything about every government contract and not even the "stupid client" (management quote there) can tell them anything about fullfilling there clients requirements.
I have to quote someone else here "If your a salaried employee,you are not entitled to a personal life. Be prepared to work 50-60hrs a week but only get paid for 40." and dont expect to ever see these hours again in any way shape or form. Regardless of what HR tells you
From a business perspective this is a "good corporate hustle"for LM. They lock most of there employees into a fixed salary then, make you work 10-20 hours a week for free.
The company's infrastructues & communication is just non-existant.
From a mangement perspective, Upper management is to pre-occupied with manipulating "the numbers" to actually care about fullfilling the clients needs or fixing any issues to meet or exceed the clients requirements. But hey, if the numbers say im doing a good job then apparently we must...well, at least on paper and less be honest in LM thats all that matters.
So if you like corporations such has Enron, Arthur Andersen, Goldman Sachs then this is the place for you
The companies main mission statement is "always do whats right" then they do the complete opposite.

I've worked at large organizations (larger than LM) and this place does not promote "life balance". Prepare to work 55 - 60 hours a week (or more) and don't expect to get more than a %2 raise per year or zero raise per year.

Fort Worth is a great place to live....but don't work at LM.

Salaried employees are not permitted to have a life outside of work. Period. Have vacation time on the books? Want to take a few days off? Forget it. Need to take a sick day to attend marriage counseling with your spouse because your job is ruining your marriage? Forget it. Want to see your kids less than a divorced dad with every other weekend visitation even though you live in the same house? Then Lockheed is the perfect employer for you. This "work/life balance" thing they hype? Non-existent. It's "work/work balance". Don't bother trying to turn down overtime. You work when they want you to work or they'll threaten to fire you. Think that 9/80 work schedule sounds good? Yeah, me, too. It's not. It's a lie. The 9/80 is supposed to mean work 5 ten-hour days the first week and 4 ten-hour days the second week to get every other Friday plus every weekend off. The actual schedule is 5 ten-hour days both weeks (no alternate Friday off) plus you have to work every other weekend. If you don't have a family or, well, a life, then by all means apply for a job with this company. If you want to stay married and see your kids grow up, run as fast and as far away as you can from this prison. The pay is okay, but the benefits suck and the job does not pay anywhere near as much as it costs you. This is a soul-crushing place to work.

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.

I worked for Lockheed Martin on a contract field team in Texas and it was the best job I ever had. If someone couldn't do their job,it was a warning and then they went out the door. No carrying dead weight. If you couldn't fit into the team and be productive, warning and out the door. If you wanted to hassle other employees, a warning and out the door.
We had very little overtime and a great site supervisor. I attribute the lack of overtime to the fact that the deadweight and distractions were pruned early in the game. If it wouldn't have been for my husband coming down sick, I would have stayed at this job. I love Lockheed!
If you think Lockheed sucks, try Boeing.

LMMFC is a BAD place to work!!! LIttle chance of promotion. Its all about who you know, now what you know. I know people that have been there 3+ years, in addition to college internships, still at level 1 (which is for entry level people coming out of college with a bachelors). I know people who have been there 3 years and they are at level 3 (bachelors plus 5 yrs exp or masters plus 3 yrs). Not based on performance, just on who you know. The work is boring, they are cramming 3 or 4 people into small cubicles now, and the management style sucks. The people here are not friendly, supervisors don't care about you, and they try to do everything they can to make you stay here even if you hate your job. If it wasn't for the crappy economy, I'd quit in a heartbeat. But I'm still looking for other jobs as we speak... Do not work here! It's not all its hyped up to be! This place is NO FUN AT ALL!

I was really surprised to see that folks hate LM so much. The only reason why I left is because I had a 1.5 hour commute each way and it was taking me away from my family. I woked in a SCIF and had little oversight. That meant little support, but also NO micromanagement. I loved being paid weekly, and the 9/80 workweek meant I used very little vacation time. Health benefits and 401k were about the industry norm. Career advancement was typical with other Aerospace as well--had to put in 20 years to advance. Those at the top certainly had their years w/ the company, but from their stories they also had varying positions and growth opportunities. I'd love to go back if it wasn't so far away!

The pay is good and one could even say excellent for the Owego, NY area. Easily enough to make a good living: The respect is there on occasion, however, with such a large company about 1 in 10 area extremely difficult to work with. The competent co-workers are around and it will be up to you to find them and build relationships with them. The unwritten rules are if you show up after 7:30 A.M you are considered a slacker. This is true even if you outperform your co-workers and stay until 6:30 PM every night. The work life balance is preached, however, taking advantage of it is another matter. Many managers will not allow employees to take advantage of the benefits the company talks about and offers. Layoffs have been the norm for the last year now as 25% of the workforce has been let go (~1,000). The leaders of the company will talk about open honest communications, which I find to be all BS. The location is great as far as traffic and cost of living. The Career growth is limited during these difficult times and it appears as if just keeping your job at this time is the best possible career move. The co-workers are becoming more difficult to manage as the 1000 or so employees let go were individual contributors leaving lots of chiefs and very few Indians. Recently many managers were side shifted into new roles; however, the new roles are still those of chiefs and not Indians. TBD on how the layoff slated for April 20th will play out. As a side note the 1st two layoffs focused on new hires as they typically received a poor ratings the first year on the job. It is expected this layoff will focus on the chiefs and not the Indians. At this time there are no job openings in Owego. There appears to be a shift in defense spending away from the big contractors, which could drive more layoffs after April 20th 2010. The only possible way better times could be ahead for Owego is with the new presidential helicopter bid. Most likely this is 3-4 years away. At this time the work environment is the worst it has been in 15 years.

Negotiate your best salary before you get hired. Once you are in, the annual review process is an unexplainable series of forms and meetings, and basically leads nowhere. If you get a good rating, there is still no guarantee of even a cost of living increase. Health plan options are scant, and the retirement contribution formula has recently been altered, cutting take-home pay.

Management extols the importance of family life and vacations - but with what? They don't seem to realize that two weeks evaporates in no time, especially when you have to take a week of it to cover for snow days. It further rubs salt in the wound when their HR office flunky keep pestering you about your vacation plans for the coming year.

Depending on the contract you are with, there might not be a training budget, so forget about career advancement with this company. Even if you find free training, you might have to make up the hours that you are away for training and not billable. However they do force you to take whats called 'compliance training' for ethics, harassment, and guarding company secrets, implying that you are a blundering clueless boob just like the guy in their training videos.

Management has had rapid turnover so there is a lack of continuity, and you end up explaining your purpose and job role many times to people who don't really care anyway.

If you end up working away from the corporate offices you then have the worst of both worlds - all the drawbacks of working for a big bureaucracy, and few of the benefits. As long as you don't expect much besides a middling paycheck, you won't be disappointed.