Intel

The benefits package is outstanding; job security is pretty good. Also, if you really wanted to, you could work there for years without ever actually having to produce a single thing of worth to the company or your co-workers.

Also, there are some really great communication channels at Intel, although one must wade through quite a bit of bias to get to the real news. I never saw more corporate Kool-Aid drinkers than at Intel. At one point, I was receiving 20+ "newsletters" per month from various corporate groups and published two myself.

Raises aren't great. Also, upper-level managers can make capriciously stupid decisions. Sometimes these changes stick, while other times, they are quietly ignored. There was never any rhyme or reason to which decisions your manager decided must be enforced, and which ones could be ignored.

I even saw this inconsistency happen at the employee level. One great example was when my division (which supported construction groups all over the planet) suddenly had telecommuting banned for all employees. Within a month or two, all of the women in my group somehow miraculously got "exceptions" to the telecommuting ban, while the two men in my group (myself included) did not.

Also, Intel is largely run by folks in their mid-50s. Although the internal groupings of the company seem to be in a constant state of flux, the true corporate management structure changes little, with the same small group of people holding relatively identical positions of power regardless of their changes in job title. There is no true hope of advancement in one's career for anyone younger than 45.

Fire at least half of all the "managers" in the company. They are worthless deadweight who add nothing of value to the company.

Also, be on the lookout for the rampant favoritism that pervades the company. There seems to be a particularly perverse bias against people who do not have children. Many times they are expected to carry two or three times the workload of their co-workers with children.

Also, I ran into more social conservatives at Intel than perhaps in the rest of all my jobs combined. During my three years at Intel, I experienced an ongoing albeit subtle sense of hostility directed at me, due largely to my homosexual orientation. One boss actually went so far as to try and arrange a "date" between myself and her daughter.