Opportunity, with some frustrations...in the end though - a good place to start.
Pros
One of the great things about working at Hughes was that I was able to incrementally work my way up from a very low level to being a higher technical job in one of the engineering groups. There were some frustrations that made me leave, but in the end Hughes gave me a good start. It was a good part of my life when I needed it, and is something I'll always look back on with fondness as part of the good ole days.
Cons
The downside of working in ops was that it seemed we often ran out of parts to the extent that it affected production and operations. The people that could make a difference didn't care to fix the problems. This was my biggest frustration about working in ops (caring about getting the job done well, but not getting sufficient planning and operational support to follow through). By the time I was in engineering, the principal frustration was getting circuit boards repaired and spare parts to support my engineering staff. I was told that it was because the electronics techs were so backed up with work. This was my single biggest frustration working in the engineering group; again though this pointed back to operations, and not engineering. I believe ops is now under a new manager though so hopefully things have improved. In engineering, I remember we had a CM person that seemed incompetent, and I was left wondering how she got a job that put me lower than her on the totem pole. However, over time I've come to realize this scenario is repeated in many workplaces for many people. Overall though, the engineering grunts that I worked with were a close knit bunch, intelligent, and hardworking. I left, because of a few frustrations mentioned here, but also largely because given the market conditions at the time, I could do better elsewhere.
