Growth for ambitious people can be slow unless you have an executive sponsor or are politically connected. For most roles, especially at the Staff / Senior level and above, the primary consideration is whether or not you have "experience" doing work in that role. An engineer with two masters degree can get beat out by somebody with a degree in Communications or Business Administration with less overall work experience, because the latter has "specific" experience related to that role. This is an issue I have seen across the Aerospace and Defense industry. Many roles are overly specialized and this creates an issue whereby it is difficult for someone to take on roles in different areas.
The company sponsors masters degrees and MBAs but they mostly serve just as a way to retain lower-level employees. They mainly assist in possibly getting you an interview. Once you get the interview, you are considered "equal" to somebody with a "Bachelors" degree. It gives you a limited advantage in overall consideration for the role. One wonders why Lockheed even bothers sponsoring the benefit?
HR will always be cheap. Especially when it comes to internal employees. Count on them to give less than 80% of market value if they can get away with it.
