Amazon

Get your hands dirty on work millions use on a daily basis. Unlike Microsoft, this company across the lake does ship code.

1. Very twisted compensation package. You are evaluated based on salary + stock, which should be 'given' although not vested. The management sees that as 'you are well compensated' and would give away next to nothing for the hard work next year.

2. Terrible on-call. It's really a nightmare. Work-life balance is as bad as the worst story your friend told you. IT'S ALL TRUE.

3. Very bad benefit package. But you knew it when you got the offer, so can't complain too much about it.

4. Middle management is not transparent at all. You see the tree but not the forest. Sometimes they'd lie about promotion/compensation to get you to work extra on top of an already overloaded work-life balance. But it could be just my case.

Upper management has great vision and the direction is great.

Please treat your employees well. They are not replacement parts.

Being frugal is ridiculously emphasized. You can keep hiring people with a high turnover rate now, but this is not right.

Bezos said 'kindness is a choice' during his Princeton speech. Well, 'kindness' is definitely the choice Amazon chose to treat its employees.