Bloomberg LP

The Location (New York, NY).

Free snacks and fruits at the pantry.

Perceived brand value in the job market.

Networking with other people.

The finance courses (most of them taught by Stuart Veale).

If you are a person who likes to be an independent contributor, technologically focused, and be given some free rein on your projects, or if you are a decent programmer who expects a disciplined approach to programming (most of the code is haphazard and difficult to maintain), this company may not be for you.

Bloomberg has many ridiculous bottlenecks that would make any sane programmer cry with agony. I'm not understating this; you can get hints from all the reviews before mine. These bottlenecks/annoyances are not just in your day-to-day development but also while you are in the building.

The badge-in/badge-out, the security making rounds around the office who stop you and sternly ask to wear your badge, even while you are just going to get a coffee in the pantry (I've had to literally go back to my desk to get it). I encourage you to visit the premises and talk to existing employees beforehand to get an idea of what you are getting into.

There's no proper cafeteria area to eat your food. The running joke was that the bigwigs expect you to eat at your desk, so you will be around to be called upon by your manager/peer during that time.

You might end up in teams (from what I've learned, this is most of them) where there is rampant micromanagement, including hints dropped about you being expected to work on weekends/late hours to meet an arbitrarily set, extremely tight deadline, even for internal projects.

I believe that the "thought worker" who takes pride in his/her work cannot thrive in cultures like Bloomberg.

Well, there are tons!

Here are a few:

• Start by giving developers the space to breathe and actually develop stuff and fix things that are so profoundly broken in your system.

• Your strategy of treating your employees like rubbish is going to hurt you in the long term -- this needs to be addressed ASAP.

• Great companies are built with great people. If you want to retain these great people, treat them well!

Also, this should be essential reading for new employees: "Built to Last," not just the "Bloomberg by Bloomberg" you hand your new hires.