Microsoft

Good pay, stable job, lots of technical resources. MSR has tons of cool stuff going on (but you need a PhD to join).

Slow-moving (though some groups are getting faster). Hard for young, passionate people to make a true impact, stifling your desire to keep trying to change things. Stuck in the MSFT tech stack (.NET). Bad resume brand if you ever want to go to a smaller company. Too many PMs often slow things down instead of helping. Can develop a bad mentality as a dev since focusing on testing is "not your job". Benefits aren't as good as companies in the Bay Area. Management and teams are very hit and miss. Culture just isn't that exciting. Lots of 10+ year vets (which isn't necessarily a bad thing), but it doesn't seem like many people are eager to shake things up. Many teams don't seem all that necessary (their cost

doesn't warrant existence) or don't have clear goals (think internal tool teams, etc).

As a young person, I think it's probably better to end up at a place like Microsoft later in your career.