Pros
If you are a confident, talented, engineer, scientist, or technician; then, Lockheed offers some of the most challenging and interesting work you will find in the aerospace and defense (A&D) industry. Although, Lockheed seems to recruit from the second tier technical schools, they generally go for the absolute best talent at those schools. That said, you will still find a few MIT grads working there. As the largest A&D contractor in the US, you will find ample opportunities to work on a variety technologies with a wide variety of customers and their applications of technology. Many managers, rise from the technical ranks. However, to rise to the executive ranks, those with the best interpersonal skills survive their technical assignments until they get to management assignments to leverage their soft-skills. For military transitioning into this company, it is a very patriotic culture where integrity is strictly enforced. Most military personnel find it easy to adapt at Lockheed. For seasoned professionals transitioning into the company, the pay and benefits are very competitive and the technical work is some of the best. For early career professionals, it is an excellent place to start your career provided you are one of the top students in your class. It is a company rich with opportunity and exposure to new things. For all employees, if you are fortunate enough to be deemed a high-potential (Hi-Pot) employee, then Lockheed Martin has some of the best leadership training and professional development in the world.
Cons
As a company, Lockheed can be brutal on incompetence and failures. By this, as a technical professional, your ideas, knowledge and abilities will constantly be questioned by peers and managers. Everyday to show up for work, you have to prove yourself all over again. If you can not defend your technical knowledge successfully you will be marginalized and most likely leave the company. The mark of death by the technical professionals is to be called a "non-technical." If you can not shake this label, then everything you say will fall on polite but deaf ears. The culture is harsh on anyone that do not strive for professional excellence. If this happens, your best hope is to find a position in management. As for managers, failure to meet extremely challenging objectives or satisfy even the most difficult customers is dealt with harshly. In many cases it can be the end of your career at Lockheed Martin. It only takes one failure to be tagged unworthy of leadership and part of the "de-railed" class of managers that float around seeking redemption. Your only chance of recovery is a guardian angel in the executive ranks that has clout. Otherwise, start looking for new opportunities or resolve your career ambitions to your current role in the company. As a result of this cultural attitude, Lockheed is a very conservative, risk adverse company. Which leads to the Lockheed "innovation misconception." Although, Lockheed is great for innovative problem solvers it is not much fun for creative, intuitive, or artistic thinkers. Unless you can back up your creative ideas with irrefutable detailed facts & figures; then, decision-makers will most likely dismiss you and your ideas. If you persists with your "brilliant ideas" they may label you as an "eccentric." Most successful revolutionary innovations at Lockheed occur when the ideas are developed under the radar and revealed as proof of concepts; or, with approved IRAD funding. However, if you expend company resources under the radar and fail to deliver a successful innovation; then, you've just signed your career death certificate at this company. Lets face it, Lockheed is more an engineering company and less a design studio or R&D firm. They solve complex problems they do not set out to create novel technologies. So don't be confused by the innovation propaganda. If you want true creative innovation, consider GE, Battelle Memorial labs, Apple, IDEO, etc. If you want to solve complex problems, then consider Lockheed.
