Microsoft

• Base salary is very good for engineering disciplines.
• Cash bonuses and stock bonuses are excellent (based solely on performance).
• Health coverage is top-notch (was better before Obamacare, but still great).
• Huge discounts on MS products and for local businesses in the Seattle area.
• Free commuter services to many neighborhoods.
• Free coffee, soda, juice, and tea.
• Excellent schools in Washington, good quality of life for family.
• No travel is required for most.
• Very smart coworkers; most have a great work ethic.

At MS, you get what you work for. If you put in the extra effort, work 12-hour days, perform better than your peers, and get the necessary visibility for your contributions, then you will be rewarded well with good performance reviews. With good performance reviews come huge merit raises, bonuses, stock, and frequent promotions.

• Heavyweight performance review process
• Lots of meetings
• Corporate politics and good ol' boy networks
• Intense peer competition among individual contributors for fear of being "managed out"
• Poor communication from management to ICs about organizational restructuring
• 3 organizational restructurings (re-orgs) within 2 years
• Company-wide shift to "combined engineering" (SDE and SDET are no longer separate disciplines) in progress.
• Company-wide flattening (removing the first layer of management) in progress. Leads have to become ICs, which is a demotion as far as resumes and career growth are concerned.
• Company-wide shift to maintain talent by allowing anyone to change teams without notifying their manager
• Only young folks. Rarely will you find an engineer over 50.
• Cost of living is very high in the Seattle area. Housing is even higher than the SF Bay Area.

Stop chasing Apple, Google, and Amazon, and start leading the industry.

Don't toss out core values that made the company strong, e.g., Windows application compatibility and quality focus, in favor of being "hip" and agile.