Working at Raytheon — Reviews by Employees

Working at Missile Systems has been the greatest mistake I have made in my career. I just lost the past 4 years in an environment that does not encourage teamwork and inclusion, and where incompetence and inneficiency are rewarded if you kiss the bosses behinds.

Peers: I saw people playing solitaire for complete days and still charing to the program charge numbers. Projects behind schedule, and over budget while still not meeting the performance requirements. These people are plain right evil, as they tried to defend their turf at all cost. As an Engineer I was working with a lot of older folks that didn't even had college degrees, did not show any single bit of drive to improve things around, and learned how to play the system so bad that they could even stay home for a week and their leaders would not notice!!! It was ridiculous. Not everyone was bad, but the majority was!!!

I got the chance to be a team lead during my time there and this little army brat had the audacity to brag about how he played the system, probably expecting me to applaud him given everybody does it... When I tried to get that little arrogant punk to work he got my superiors to work on destroying me because I was turning the screws on this guy to get him to work!!! My superiors where friends of this punk's family for years (that's how he got the job) and made my life miserable for trying to get an employee to work. I sometimes called this guy on the phone and even once heard his wife and his baby crying on his car when he was supposed to be covering some tests in the plant site!!!! Unvelievable!!!

Management: Believe everyone who says this: They don't have a freaking clue!!! It's all about politics, and playing the game. The programs are in shambles, money being wasted left and right and these people deliberately block any effort to speak your mind against it or even trying to do something to make things better. And the evaluation process? It's who you know, not what you have done. I even witness people being blocked when they tried to move to another department... I know... I have always been able to be neutral and these incompetents made this comments everywhere....

Senior Leadership: Taylor Lawrence is a very good politician. Big show, nothing more.... He says all the right things but does not do anything to improve the conditions of the company or its integrity...

You know that these morons once did a test firing a missile and the darn thing turn right back towards the ship that fired it, only missing by a small fraction? Massive production problems on the Tomahawk production line with deffective O-rings and hardware leaking fuel.... I could speak about tons of "Engineering" issues there but it doesn't matter.... As long as you have your little charge number keep on chargin' even if you don't do nothin'!!! And given that there is no real competition on this market what is the goverment going to do?

I could go on and on but I won't. This has been the worst professional experience of my career, and I would advice any Engineer or professional that is driven by a passion of results and hard work to go somewhere else. If you are a white trash slacker, that knows how to kiss your bosses behinds and have no sense of ethics in the workplace you will feel right at home.

Avoid like the plague folks... Avoid like the plague...

As a place to work, Raytheon in Tucson is probably somewhere in the middle as far as military contractors go. I like living in the Tucson area, but Raytheon is the only large defense contractor in the area, and if for whatever reason you decide you don't like working at Raytheon, you will almost certainly have to move. Whenever you have a situation like that at any company...not just Raytheon...it means that there will be a lot more backstabbing on the job because people who have bought houses locally and have kids in the schools really don't want to relocate, and become desperate to get one of the few promotions.

If you are a straight white male, Raytheon's deck is stacked against you. With Raytheon's "diversity" program, unless you are in one of the favored groups, they discriminate against you, and you have virtually no legal recourse. Their most favorite demographic groups are blacks, hispanics, women, and homosexuals. Like all military contractors, they also strongly favor military veterans.

Of course, I am not suggesting that most of the people in the top slots and making the most money are in these groups...that just isn't the case. But what I am saying is that if you are a member of one of the favored groups and show any ability or initiative, then you will likely be rewarded far out of proportion to your actual ability and contribution. This will be at the expense of white males, who are expected to work much harder, and to grin and bear it.

Half of you reviewers are nitwits. I'm not a missile-toting right wing nut but Raytheon is a great company to work for. Yes, you're rated on the work you do, but guess what, if you do good work you'll be just fine!

Yes, much of the workforce is predominantly older white males but guess what, they've been around for 30 years! Do you really think we had a strong minority or female workplace when we were testing missiles back in the 70s and 80s?

They pay well, they're flexible on scheduling and hours when you have appointments, and they have great lateral movement opportunities. For everyone who was 'sabotaged' by an incompetent section head or were 'destroyed' by management wise up and move somewhere else.

Much of the aging workforce is retiring anyway and in 5-10 years us youngbloods will be running the place.

I would complain about management if we had any.

I was placed on the "hit list" when I got my future boss in deep trouble after I went over his head after he demanded that I charge company IRAD work to a military contract number. As my boss he gave me a bad review and after he left the department, he had his "flunky" continue to give me bad ratings until they finally laid me off. Good riddence! My life as been a lot less stressful since my departure.

They only want vets don't they? Younger people who can't show up on time? It's another tax payer funded milking operation as all the defense companies are. That's what's wrong with all of America's business class. They can't pull their heads out of their ass holes long enough to see there's a tax revolt coming. The bed wetters in the defense industry will have to get real jobs.

This place is a retirement home for war veterans! If you are an old, white, male, and super republican.....then you will fit right in. If not, get ready to meet some of the most ignorant, racist, and sexist people in the world. Management here just sucks. They don't care about your career interests or what you want to work on. They just put you on a job as there as there is a charge number you can use. The people who climb the ladder are just arrogant, rude, and ready to throw anyone under the bus to make their boss happy. There is no respect here for engineers.....working here will only make you dumber and lazier. All they care about is time and schedule.....forget good engineering practices.....half the stuff this company sells is crap! The govt should do an investigation on this company......its just full of frauds! This place is going to shut down sooner or later......so get out while you can!

I have been with Raytheon for almost 10 years. I started working in Las Vegas with Raytheon Technical Services Company, moved to El Segundo, CA and worked for Space and Airborne Systems and then transferred to Portsmouth, RI for Integrated Defense Systems. I’ve been around and it is all the same. When they transferred me to Rhode Island, I thought we had a contract for many years; instead they had no work for me and even blamed me for not finding any. We’re supposed to have section managers to find work for the engineers, but instead they work to find work for themselves and stab you in the back during evaluations. There is a common theme: promote the inept and keep the smart ones around to fix the stuff that the “simple-minded” promoted-too-fast nitwits destroy. The Government should launch a FULL investigation and dissect this fraud factory. This place is full of psychotic, ego-maniacs, snakes and just the bottom of the barrel scum. I can’t wait to get out of here, but the only thing keeping me is a steady paycheck and health insurance. I think they should start hiring accountants and business students, because we don’t build anything (just paperwork) and they have made it very clear that we are working for our stock holders; not the customer, not the employees and not the future of this pyramid ready to topple over. The Titanic (Raytheon) is and has been sinking for some time, reporting fantasy profits (remember Enron) on the back of their employees. I was told that I would receive a “Needs Improvement” rating because of some lame excuse (remember: they can say ANYTHING without proof to get you in trouble to suit their financial needs.). This is called Industrial Justice and it is widely used to train managers and team leads. All they need is enough to say that you were “likely” to do something that would make you look bad and thus you are not deemed worthy of receiving a raise or the famous profit sharing. So to save money this year, they managed to give poor ratings to those who have been “black-listed” (not part of the league of managers) and have counted that as profit for their shareholders.

Those who believe in the lie of Raytheon have not been here long enough. Do not consider this as a career. This place is toxic and will continue to be until the scheme comes crashing down. I have more to say, but it would take all day.

Decent pay and benefits in the current economic environment and job market. But the benefits are getting trimmed every year. And if you take into account how many hours you work and the amount of stress you have to endure, your annual salary just doesn't seem enough. The company offers flexibility in work hours and ability to work from home, which helps. No bonus (unless you are at executive level), and raises and profit sharing amounts are laughable. Job security must be good, as everywhere you look, you see overweighed, incompetent old timers waiting for retirement and their fat pensions.

Lots of lip service from senior management but no action to back it up. Employees are not respected or appreciated. Top-down approach on everything to force things down employees' throats without any interest in feedback. Numerous procedures and processes and then more processes and deadwood departments to manage them. Half of the work you do create no real value but are mandated by policies and processes. The company fosters a risk adverse and blame-others culture. All managers are only interested in managing "up" to their bosses so they can get their next promotion. No interest in the welfare of their subordinates. Then they act like doing you a favor by keeping you employed.

Oh yeah, you have work in old, smelly and outdated facilities in bad neighborhoods, with no windows and behind barbed wires. But the armed security guards should make you feel safer.

I would say Raytheon was a great company to work for except that after working there 6 months I was laid-off . I left a decent job to go to Raytheon , but when I got there there was really no job for me. The management or should I say lack of management amazed me . No one had a clue ! It was defenitly the blind reading to the deaf ! I don't know how this company stays in buisness or produces anything .