A great place but there's some major setbacks that...

A great place but there's some major setbacks that need to be modernized to meet the standards of other workplaces.

The work hours situation is incredibly asinine and contrived. Unlike most workplaces which offer flexibility which is critical for modern familes, the schedule adjustments are far too rigid. And it isn't necessary to be that way for most ppl here and the jobs performed. they're definitely cases of certain tests projects timelines deadlines we're absolutely makes sense things will be more rigid, but for the normal day-to-day things should definitely change. For example if I simply wanted to work slightly different hours on different days or have to come in late for some reason one day a week, or any other number of simple and very common work-life balance situations, it really isn't possible in instances or it's frowned upon or requires specific special requests on a regular basis. They could easily implement something that many other jobs do which is a flexible work week featuring core hours ex: 10am - 3pm either 3, 4 or 5 days a week and easily manage the remaining hours or days for any given employee. This discourages younger families with two full-time working parents -which is most people- and especially women (who by default almost always need more flexibility if they are working and have a family) from getting into the workplace here.

Getting daycare assistance here which is offered, is not prioritized for women employees. Our military personnel are one of our most valuable assets and their patriotic dedication is unmatched. However, there are many people who take advantage of this while having a military spouse but do not work at all themselves and simply do not need full time childcare. They take up valuable spots of full-time available slots. I wish that the needs of employees here were prioritized more with the actual needs of the individual. It's difficult enough for those who must have both parents work full time and unfortunate that such a potentially great benefit is abused in such a way.

There is also a lot of 'old boys club' cliques and/or mentalities that persist here. This definitely varies from department to department, but overall it appears to be fairly pervasive. Women are undoubtedly discriminated against and treated differently than their male colleagues. There's far too much protecting the the old boys or bringing ppl into the old boys club who are not going to benefit the work place overall. To top it off, as you can imagine, it's incredibly difficult for someone to want to speak out or advocate changes in this behavior; not only will they be treated as the wrong-doer, but they will miss out on career opportunities and promotions as well as be ostracized by their peers. Silence is encouraged or you're deliberately ignored at worst and at best it is peer pressured by default. Men and women in positions of power here in need to crack down on this hard while also rewarding both men and women who promote a positive workplace environment.

This might sound like an opinionated and subjective rant. However, I feel strongly that if you're missing out on valuable young employees, more diverse employees or female employees with potentially stronger skill-sets than their peers because of these issues, then this is a national security issue. Worse yet you're probably not retaining potentially valuable assets that you might already have. If we (collective Patriotic USA) cannot produce results that exceed the expectations of the United States DOD and surpass those of our international opponents, then this is a major problem indeed.