Pros: Good and smart people to work with. Infra got many improvements in recent years. Internal doc system is good and relatively easy to find the information.

Cons: Compensation policy is not very clear. Benefits, such as medical plan and 401k match, are OK, but not very good.

Pros: Bleeding-edge work. There are many opportunities to innovate in the datacenter switching space, especially if you work on SDN. Very smart, knowledgeable engineering team. I've learned a lot during my time here. Great work culture. No problems with working from home. Helpful, approachable colleagues. Managers don't micromanage. I'm given a choice of projects rather than being assigned one. There’s a “just do it” attitude - anyone can pick up anything that they think needs improvement and make it better. The focus is on building great products. Switching teams to work on something different is a breeze. Free snacks on every floor. Very good work-life balance. I’ve hardly ever worked on weekends. PTO policy is quite generous. Best development environment I've worked in. Version control wrappers, a custom programming language, well-thought-out software architecture, and automated testing make coding, browsing code, integrating, and testing hassle-free. Excellent place for fresh grads looking to build system software coding and design skills for the future.

Cons: Pre-IPO stock options were very attractive, but salaries and benefits have remained well below the industry average, even post-IPO. Pay hikes are rare. There is no 401k matching. Refresher stock grants are minuscule compared to the initial grant. The bonus payout is low, as it’s a percentage of the depressed base salary. There is no target percentage, so employees don't have an idea what they will be paid. The criteria for determining bonus payouts isn't made clear to employees. There is a pretty high attrition rate after pre-IPO stock grants vest because of the steep drop in total compensation. Career paths are not well defined, and the opacity of the review process is difficult to deal with. Engineer levels are kept confidential, so it's hard to know when or if you are making progress. When asked for specific input on how to grow into larger roles, management gives very broad feedback. Also, the flat organization structure makes it very hard to move from individual contributor roles to people management. There is some risk that the company's growth will be hurt by ongoing litigation. Certain important green card documents are withheld from H1 employees. Although it can be worked around, it is an unnecessary inconvenience.

Pros: You get to work with some of the industry's best. And not "work with" like you see them once a year, but "work with" as in you're on the same team. The caliber of people here is just outstanding! The company really respects its employees. Individual opinions, time, work-style - all are valued. This leads to this being a great place to do work. A lot of procedures in place are there to minimize overhead and repetitious tasks - hence a phenomenal build system, automated test infrastructure, and the most painless merge / mergeback setup I've ever used. I feel like I'm learning a lot every day (2 years and still going strong). It's really humbling to look at the more senior people and see how much more I have to learn! The company is working in a really rich sector which is quickly growing. The company is growing really quickly and that presents a lot of career growth opportunities. There's a strong drive towards internal promotion instead of external hiring whenever possible. We actually sell something you can touch! This may seem foolish, but selling something real, something where your software actuates a physical action, is really rewarding. Leadership has done a great job of keeping the focus on Engineering rather than managers. All of the managers here were engineers first, and accepted a management position because they made good managers, but also because they saw the need for oversight and direction, and agreed they were the best person to provide it. Management seems to view its role as "getting out of the way of software engineers so that they can do what they do best - engineer software" which leads to a very healthy culture. Very open culture at all levels. Engineers talk with Jayshree around the coffee machine, a weekly beer-bash encourages people to mix and meet with others from around the company. Arista is in it for the long-haul. When asked if we were firmly committed to an IPO as an exit strategy our CEO responded no, that's our *entry* strategy; we're not here to exit, we're here to change datacenter networking and you can't do that if you just exit. Wide range of Software Engineering from firmware and EE-style register twiddling to very high-level programming. Solid mentoring and development opportunities: * 20 days/yr of PTO for everyone. * Weekly beer bash!

Cons: Arista wasn't founded by Web 2.0 kids, and the perks don't shadow those companies. There are no free meals (although the snack bar is pretty darn good), no subsidized gym memberships, no on-campus dinner, no massages, no laundry, no daycare, etc. It's a workplace, and not a place to live. IMHO, that last one is actually a pro, but individual mileage may vary. You won't be made an instant mega-millionaire Instagram-style, because that's not the game Arista is playing. Most of your friends will have no clue what you work on. You can't pull up a website and show them. Most of the time, you'll settle for something like "we make the internet work" and move on. On a day-to-day basis, the work isn't super-flashy; it's just solid, interesting problem-solving. (More of a neutral than a con.)