Amazon

Very smart people -- people aren't only smart intellectually; they are also fairly diverse, so you can actually start to live a normal "life" even if you hang out only with work friends.

Opportunities are easy to come by if you are:

• Able to prove that you can get stuff done
• Driven to find the opportunities.

All you have to do is ask.

Often, it is easy to lose sight of people's personal lives. Most managers are of the same kind: the personal side of the employee comes much later in the decision-making process, unless the employee puts it front and center.

The "NPI"s will often derail the best carrots put in front of employees. A project that you were looking forward to this year will often be delayed by a year because of something else that is necessary for the company.

Be more mindful of how the compensation plan is structured. Often, employees feel that they have to pay for contributing to the success two years ago by getting a small compensation in an existing year.

Expect all remote development centers to work just like the main "mothership" in Seattle.