Pros: Decent benefits. Potential to grow. The higher the position, the easier your life. Enjoy life.

Cons: Too much politics and bureaucracy. Your ability is evaluated more based on how you speak, instead of how you speak and deliver. Some PMs do not know what a PM should do.

Pros: There are a lot of really smart people; this is the main reason I joined the company.

Cons: Bad development processes. The only people who think we're cutting edge are those who never worked elsewhere or don't write code in their spare time and haven't been exposed to alternatives. It doesn't take tons of developers to deliver great software. Software is one of the rare industries where it's possible to grow through productivity gain rather than headcount expansion. Microsoft is dominated by conservative people. There are so many innovative ideas around here, and yet very few of them ever make it into a product, and the truly innovative products languish. The priority is to lock in existing customers instead of winning new ones. Hence backward compatibility takes precedence over innovation. My feeling is that if your group name doesn't have "research" or "labs" in the title, it's probably not worth working for.

Pros: The pros would be a balanced environment to work in, with many smart people around. Get to work with various technologies. Can move around to find the job that you are passionate about.

Cons: You need to find the right team and manager for yourself. Growth can be slow in some of the bigger teams.