Microsoft

Pretty chill place, especially if your managers are overseas. Tons of interesting projects and potential for impact.

If you joined recently, the pay is pretty competitive, especially if you include stocks. It seems that, at least so far, it is relatively easy to meet and exceed expectations within my team.

Your mileage may vary per team.

Sometimes it feels like our velocity is near zero and no one seems to be too concerned about it. Add to that the byzantine bureaucracy and the delays with depending on US-based and very busy teams, and it is pretty painful if you care or are used to fast-paced startup environments.

Lack of visibility into some higher-level decisions, recent layoffs included.

On a personal note, I never liked any MSFT products, and seeing how they are built from the inside, from a technical and organizational perspective, validates my dislike for them.

I don't think they'd have any reason to care for my advice, but if the idea is on focusing on productivity, look for organizational and cultural changes rather than firing "low performers". A carrot is always better than a stick.