Pros
- pretty good work/life balance (except for areas like testing/manufacturing, which require weekend and evening shifts). I work an average of 40 hrs/wk, with exceptions for known crunch times, and have yet to be penalized for not working overtime. I see managers and directors leave work early to pick up their kids. Results will vary with the area and program you're working in, though, and you definitely have to be willing to pitch in extra when things get busy. - reasonably easy to move around if you're a strong performer - great vacation: 3 weeks vacation, a holiday shutdown, and every other Friday off (if your workload permits). Altogether, it adds up to about 8 weeks off per year. If you put in legwork to find projects that are interesting, ask around to see who's good to work with and then go talk to those folks (and avoid managers known to be toxic), find at least a couple of people willing to mentor you, and perform well, I think you'll find the experience you're looking for.
Cons
- most programs are not cutting-edge or fast-moving. This means if you stay in one place for too long, you could fail to maintain or develop your skills (despite corporate mantras to "continue learning"). That is career suicide. So you have to frequently look for new experiences to keep you sharp. - on that note, technical challenges are lacking; there's a high dependency on building from heritage. that's low risk, but not really exciting or difficult. it amounts to busy-work. - it's difficult to be widely recognized as a high performer without entering one of the leadership development programs. These exist at several career levels, but I can see how NOT being in one can really hurt your progression here. - if you'd like to move to a smaller company eventually, being at Lockheed could make that difficult. You might become dependent on the processes LM has in place and fail in a smaller company; even if you're great, other companies will certainly fear that this is the case. - Even if varied experiences are easy to find, promotions have decreased in recent years. So you have to push harder for them. - yes, layoffs happen, but they happen everywhere. Make sure you're on a program that's funded.