Goldman Sachs

Intelligent workers amidst the masses.

Many talented new hires.

Some parts of the internal tech stack are supported well, given the company size and business sector.

Nice benefits and holiday time.

Nice company events are available to all employees.

Nice relative starting pay, though it doesn't scale well at all unless you flex an offer. Starting positions are mostly stepping stones.

Very nice pay for experienced hires.

• Internal tech can be a burden, but is required for security or company politics reasons.
• Internal tech can be used heavily and then abandoned.
• Code reviews are uncommon. Code test coverage is forced, but the act of testing isn't accounted for in project planning, which leads to haphazard tests built to touch many lines and always pass.
• Work hours vary by team; some teams are very overworked. Avoid at all costs, you will get paid the same more or less.
• Insane support hours on some teams. Avoid support-heavy teams at all costs, or you will be working after hours and weekends unpaid.
• Some people take themselves and the job too seriously. This "Big Bank mentality" can cause a lot of unnecessary stress.
• Lots of politics and "chest beating" to get things done and move ahead.
• Stressful emphasis on having your body in your seat for as many hours as possible to show that you're "working", on many teams.
• Many longer-term employees figure out the system and become below-average engineers/contributors who know how to play politics and play up their work.
• At times, toxic employees take your work as theirs or conjure new realities to put you/others down when you've done no wrong and brush off their blatant mistakes. The system rewards this behavior, so nasty, less-than-talented individuals move up quickly.
• Talented new hires are not retained because the company reward structure is too safe. It's hard to get an early promotion or non-standard bonus without flexing a job offer, and typically the offer is better, so you just leave.

Push for quality of code.

Push against business asks that are unreasonable. Rushed products lead to 'keeping the lights on' and eventual team turnover as you maintain a broken product.

If the team needs to crunch for a week or two, that's fine. If the team needs to crunch for half a year and the product is still not done, there's a problem with the ask versus the available headcount.

Be human. Don't let work take priority over social events. Take lunch on occasion. Don't overdo crunch time, or the team will burn out.