Northrop Grumman reviews about "upper management"

The business is struggling to acquire contracts so work is dwindling at the Space Park site at an alarming rate with no positive forecast in the future. The site is in a no hire no fire mode right now, which is understandable, but it is making a long term career here both risky in terms of a potential layoffs and limiting career growth in general if you want to climb the ladder. Leadership and upper management also have done a poor job retaining our best talent, most of our best people leave to competititors and the knowledge they have is not being passed down or retained in any way. Being a good employee here is not rewarded so I can't blame them for leaving.

- no promotions - no paid over time - no clarity on performance - employees are just a number - awful attrition because of management who will lie to their employees

1. Subjective Evaluation vs. Objective Data The Problem: Management prioritizes "perceived" speed or "social visibility" over actual system reliability. The Con: This creates a "Performance Theater" where the person who looks busiest or follows the most traditional social cues is rewarded, while the engineer who does deep-trace logic analysis to prevent system failures is labeled "slow." 2. Failure of ADA Compliance & Accommodations The Problem: Ignoring a medical diagnosis (ADHD) and maintaining a PIP based on symptoms of that diagnosis is a fundamental failure of the Interactive Process required by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). The Con: The company culture lacks the maturity to integrate diverse cognitive styles, choosing "conformity" over the high-level problem-solving skills that neurodivergent engineers often bring to complex systems. 3. "Legacy" Management Debt The Problem: Using outdated "intuition-based" management styles (common in older defense contractors) rather than modern engineering metrics like DORA. The Con: In these environments, you are essentially at the mercy of your manager's personal opinion. If they don't understand your workflow, they categorize it as a failure, regardless of the technical quality of the output. 4. The "PIP" Trap The Problem: Using a PIP as a "death row" for employment rather than a roadmap. The Con: Once the "administrative machinery" for firing someone starts, it rarely stops, even if a team lead provides positive feedback. This shows a disconnect between the people doing the work and the HR/Upper Management level.

Difficult to get promoted. Seems to have too many people in upper management. Big company so don't get to meet people from other departments.

-NG pay raises never keep up with inflation. Negotiate your salary first before coming here, because average employees get 2-3%, high performers get 3-4% if you're lucky. The longer you stay the more underpaid you are -Promotions are non existent. You must change jobs or leave the company to get a true promotion -Return to work. NG used to tout itself as a flexible employer, but they're course corrected hard and are forcing employees into offices 5 days a week. That includes employees that have worked remotely for over 5-10 years. Despite owning several of their properties and not paying a lease, the dinosaur management is insistent work must be performed on site, even though they've posted record profits while having employees work remotely for half a decade. The worst part is that the on site requirement is combined with hours over 40 a week. They have no respect for work/life balance despite them claiming they due. Even for internal reviews and deadlines they are extremely unflexible. They have an expectation that you work on holidays as well; they put out internal schedules for Finance and Accounting each month whereby deadlines include holidays. Don't believe a word they say about work/life balance, when push comes to shove they will through you under the bus for trying to stand up for yourself and your personal time/commitments -Nepotism. If you read through reviews of NG here, you'll notice a trend that nepotism is frequently mentioned. It's because it's true: if you're at a NG site that's been around for more than a few decades, you will notice employees related to each other, best buddies from college/high school, etc, even working in the same department. It is extremely unprofessional and they treat it like it's normal because many people have never worked anywhere else in their career at these legacy sites -Culture: an employee departed recently and in his exit interview claimed that he had never seen any other employer that had such a "hall monitor" culture as NG. Employees will walk around the offices all day spying on one another, seeing who is or isn't in the office, etc, and report it up to their management. The management has a high school gossip mentality, and I have seen numerous examples of them sharing employees' medical history issues with other employees (despite that being illegal under the FMLA). An employee at a site in MD recently passed away at the actual site from overwork and stress. NG tried to course correct hard but putting out numerous communications saying mental health matters to them: and then within a matter of weeks was sending out mandates forcing employees back into the office, and still forcing certain departments to work late nights/weekends/holidays. Again, don't believe a word of it, it's all lip service. -They are an old school good old boys club. Discrimination for gender and race run rampant. Extremely unprofessional comments are frequently said in the workplace; HR takes no action whatsoever on these. The "nail that stands up gets hammered down" mentality is alive and well at NG. If you come in as a new hire and try and offer new ideas on your role or function, you will be met with extreme negativity. -Bloated upper management. NG is the most unfocused Finance function I have ever seen in this industry. They require an enormous plethora of reports and reviews every month, and have no focus on exactly what financial metrics matter to them. Instead they ask for reports and variance reports upon variance reports, with no guidance as to what or doesn't truly matter to them, it's all on a whim. The upper management is so bloated you have people holding reviews to prep for their reviews with their management because they need to prep for their reviews with their management. Entire layers of middle management could be removed and it wouldn't impact business operations whatsoever. Even asking a simple question such as "I have two tasks to work on right now. Which is the priority?" The answer from management is always "both". Most managers are just pass throughs for their upper management and will never challenge their own management or stand up for their employees. They will 100% say one thing to your face and turn around and do the opposite. Do not trust anyone in management here, very two faced and insincere.

Communication issues from upper to mid management caused confused

Company Culture and Upper Management

Upper management, internal promotions are slow and underpaid

Workload can be intense during project deadlines Bureaucratic structure can slow down decision-making Limited transparency in upper management communication Some locations have limited advancement opportunities Pay progression can be slower compared to private tech sector