Tom Clougher
Electrical Engineering Raytheon
I've been with Raytheon Co. since I graduated from RPI in 1973 starting out at
the Missile Systems Division in MA. I spent my early years designing
electronics for missiles made at Raytheon, and moved into Management of a
Guidance and System Design Department in the mid-'80s. Just about that same
time I got married to my wife Karen and within five and a half years we had four
children. Three boys and one girl, the last two are twins (a boy and a girl).
The twins are graduating from High School this May/June. The older two boys are
out of high school my oldest went to Georgia Tech but left after two years and
is now working IT stuff for Bank of America in Boston, MA. The second oldest is
finishing up his bachelor's degree at College in FL majoring in Music Business
& Show Production at Full Sail in Winter Park just outside of Orlando FL. After managing my engineering department for about 8 years, I moved in to
technical project management leading the Engineering side for major programs at
Raytheon's Missile Systems Division and eventually in Program Manager of various
programs in the Missile Product Line. Raytheon carried out a major series of
takeovers and mergers with Texas Instruments Defense, Hughes Aircraft Defense,
and E-Systems that resulted in a bunch of consolidations and product line
movement in the late '90s and in 1998-1999 we transferred all the NE missile
products to the ex-Hughes Missile facility in Tucson, AZ. We were all asked to
consider going with the product lines but my desire to move myself and my family
to Tucson was zero so I decided to stay and find "other" work here at Raytheon
with what remained. I now work in our Integrated Defense Systems Business and
focus primarily in large radar programs.
That's a quick background of things since I graduated. I
worked with quite a few ex-RPI graduates but a lot of them have retired in the
past few years. Hiring from RPI seems to have rolled off since when I was a
department manager and I would do recruiting trips there but that's the way
things go. I have found my education at RPI to be the best when I compare it to
what I see coming out of other schools especially when it comes to applying what
you've been taught. I don't/haven't seen many guys from my graduating class but
then I really haven't gone out seeking people. Working with the DoD and at
Raytheon has been a very time consuming grind - everything seems that it needs
to be done yesterday and only recently have things come around so you feel like
you can try and balance your life and work. Many changes in how companies
approach that now versus when I first started working.