Pros
- If you are in an analysis-focused engineering department, EB has a great culture of excellence and thoroughness. Everyday I am excited to go to work because my tasks are genuinely compelling and I am entrusted with difficult and important problems as a relatively junior engineer, and given the resources and access to experienced coworkers in order to succeed. - PTO and benefits are quite good. More PTO than LockMart and NG for junior engineers. Great healthcare plans too.
Cons
- Sub-standard pay. EB has not updated its paygrades since 2019, and it shows. The company is also very rigid with payscales, and you will be offered a standard sum ($78,000) as an engineer 1 if you get an offer out of college. This isn't *awful*, but Eastern CT is expensive and Raytheon/P&W and Sikorsky both start in the 80k range. EB says it aims to pay middle-of-the-road. Apparently it hasn't gotten the memo that it is a prime defense contractor that makes nuclear submarines and should pay like it. Otherwise, it's a prestigious job that comes with a clearance and looks good on a resume when you leave after 2-3 years to get paid what you're actually worth at a different prime. - Dysfunction in non-analysis groups. Do not accept an offer from a project group, period. EB project engineering groups are full of barely-supervised junior employees who are oftentimes sloppy and don't pay adequate attention to quality procedures because there aren't enough senior people around to instruct them. They have high turnover because it's a miserable high-demand job due to the pressure the project groups are under, and are constantly having people leave because of it, which simply increases the pressure on the remaining junior employees. EB leadership needs to understand this and start paying project engineers more generously in order to get more of them to actually stick around once they make Engineer II and sort of know what they're doing. - Extreme cheapness generally. Promotions happen once a year at the same time every year, and if you had the misfortune of starting at around the time promotions get put in (late october/early november) you won't be up for one after your first year even if you'd be at over a year of time at the company by the time the promotion is effective (end of november). One of my coworkers didn't make E2 until he was at the company for two years, which is brutal given the COL in CT. There aren't great housing options here for someone making below $85k-$90k a year.