Pros: - It is a unique opportunity to experience and contribute to a system that is really helping billions of active users. - Google's products solve real-world needs of users for information. Just imagine your day without using any Google product (it would be a bit difficult for me personally). - Getting used to / learning high-quality engineering standards. - Working with the best professionals (many famous engineers and scientists work or worked at Google). - Relatively easy internal mobility. Usually, you get into Google and have access to transfer anywhere. - If you want to climb up a corporate career, that is a good place to be. - Very good corporate culture that encourages constant learning/thinking without too much pressure. - Decent compensation and great perks. - Good work-life balance.

Cons: Experience is team/manager dependent, mostly. My team has a great microculture, but I hear many stories when people don't like their teams. Internal mobility solves this issue. Good amounts of workers strive for career growth, and that is detrimental to overall work efficiency. Like gathering unnecessary metrics, non-transparent communications, calling dibs, etc. That is one of the reasons why things are moving slow. After many years of working, you get used to internal tools and the type of work that is almost only applied to big companies. Almost everything is homegrown. That means you have to keep your skills brushed to stay competitive in the job market.

Pros: Good work-life balance & pay

Cons: It's a large company, so everything from WLB to culture depends on which team you are on.

Pros: Smart, motivated colleagues. Hard problems. Great perks.

Cons: Meritocracy fails to account for luck/"right-place, right-time."