Arista Networks

1. No deadlines.
2. Super flexible.
3. Job stability.
4. Stock is doing really well.

Limited opportunity for career growth. The knowledge is also not transferable.

This is a networking company. If someone isn’t interested in networking or embedded systems, this is not the right place for them. If you want to be a regular SWE, don’t join or leave as soon as possible because the experience you gather here won’t help you in other regular SWE positions. You basically start from zero again.

The pay isn’t good considering the location.

The performance review process is kind of a popularity contest. There is no transparency at all. They won’t even share the performance review result with you. This allows them to lowball employees when it comes to raises.

The company has a flat culture, which means engineers don’t get promoted. This does not help productivity in any way. However, on a personal level, it’s challenging to track your progress and shortcomings. It is also difficult for new SWEs to determine what’s the next stage in their career by looking at senior colleagues, as every single one of them is of the same designation but with a different skill level.

The codebase is a horrible mess. No proper documentation is available, and maintaining documentation is not encouraged enough. People just write code without knowing the package design, which eventually turns every single package into a kitchen sink.

The tech is very dated. You will have to work on the terminal the whole time, which can get very depressing over time. They are using tech from the 2000s in 2022. Most of the employees are from old times and are not interested in updating the tech stack.

Collaboration between teams is challenging.

The location of the office is very remote. The transit is horrible.

HR and other departments are extremely slow. It took them almost 2 months to update my bank account for direct deposit. You can’t even get a digital copy of your T4. Also, it takes weeks to get a response from HR.

The culture of this company probably suits only a handful of people.

They should not look for smart people; instead, look for those who fit the culture.

Clearly, they are doing great with the people they have. However, new hires are leaving all the time, which means their culture and tech stack aren’t attracting new SWEs anymore.

Therefore, the recruitment process should put more weight on cultural fit. It will save both the company and SWEs time.

Also, the pay is very subpar. The company is doing really well; you can afford good pay.