Pros: Square is a great place to get your career started as a software engineer. There's a pretty high standard of code quality, good test coverage, and great knowledge sharing (lots of pair programming). It's still pretty easy to get your ideas on the table and find yourself in a position to build them out. The office is gorgeous. There are tons of perks (massage therapists & chiropractors onsite, a coffee bar with baristas, a cafeteria with a pizza oven for breakfast/lunch/dinner, etc.), and the people are all super friendly & great to work with. The thing that really sets Square apart from others is that it both has soul as a company and a viable business model. It's easy to see your work out in the real world, and it feels validating to talk with people using the actual product.

Cons: We seem to go through an inordinate amount of re-orgs, though perhaps that's normal for a company that's growing as rapidly as Square has over the last few years. With the fast growth, it's easy to slip between the cracks, so you have to keep on your toes to move with the company.

Pros: There is a strong engineering culture and decent WLB, although it has been getting rougher in recent months.

Cons: Management is in constant churn, and it is hard to buy into a vision that changes every few months. The transparency culture is quickly evaporating, and there is a push to inflate metrics like PR throughput, which have no real impact on the product.

Pros: Total compensation is okay. Amenities are decent.

Cons: Company lacks focus and direction. Multiple teams are on wildly different technology stacks. Developer tools and support are not prioritized. Often, developers don't have the infrastructure or tools needed to accomplish a task. Developer education and onboarding is left to teams. Re-orgs are frequent. Managers are not held to a consistent standard across teams.