Pros: There are a few pros: play the game, play politics, and more. If you are good at it, you will be rewarded and promoted. Some smart engineers. Benefits are okay.

Cons: - Too political. - No recognition for people who work hard and sincerely. * Middle management is incompetent and inconsistent (a bunch of no-do-gooders, honestly). - Polarized environment. - The company's core values, Integrity, Collegiality, and Rationality – gone with the wind. - Boring software, obsolete technologies and architecture. - Looking for direction; absolutely nothing organic.

Pros: Some smart people. Benefits are decent. The company has a good cash balance to burn.

Cons: The company is in the space of providing software to P&C insurers. It has undergone major changes, especially in product development. They wish to accelerate stagnated growth by executing too many things too quickly: SAAS, Cloud, and 3-month release cycles (from 18 months). All recent initiatives are new to the company, which does not have any expertise, experience, or ideas in the technologies they are venturing into. The management is not cognizant of that fact. They need to bring in tech experts from outside. They tried to an extent but are resisted internally by old-timers who do not cooperate with new talent. The middle and first-level management is terrible. They play favorites, manage by bullying, and give bad reviews. Managers thrive by managing up and do not help team members. They take care of themselves first and cover their backs first. As an employee, you are left alone, and you need to fight alone. The other pain points for the company are: the core products are built on monolithic architecture. Competition is catching up fast by providing cheaper and better insurance software. This has sent alarm bells ringing to the top management. The P/E ratio of the stock is 498, which indicates that the company is grossly overvalued. Investors are anticipating higher growth, and the earnings are meager when compared to the stock price. If you are looking to work on exciting applications and cutting-edge technologies, this is not the place to be. But, if you want to play politics, use flattery, work on boring insurance software, and do some minimal work to get through, this maybe the company for you.

Pros: Flexible schedule makes for a good work/life balance. Lots of smart, approachable people that are always willing to lend a hand. Located at the west end of the SM Bridge, the office is quite accessible from the east bay. * Stand-up desks * Powerful development systems: choice of high-end PC or Mac. IT doesn't care if you delete Windows and install Linux. Systems are replaced with an even better one every two years. Outside training and classwork is encouraged and reimbursed. Opportunities to attend conferences are available as well. Good variety of work keeps things interesting, at least in my current role.

Cons: Workspace on the development floor is crowded and sometimes noisy. Proprietary tooling and programming language are not desirable skills outside of Guidewire and thus are not 'resume material'. Once a flat management structure is becoming more hierarchical as the company has grown. I suppose this is inevitable. I've seen quite a few new managers hired from the outside rather than promoted from within the organization.