Pros: Hands-on experience Actual impact on production items

Cons: Hard work with a lot of hours.

Pros: Work on exciting projects, interact with a lot of disciplines and get to learn a lot. Lots of smart people around you. Get to see some cool things. Stock bonus - depending on when you join this can be good compensation. You can only sell if the company offers a buyback and you need to cover the tax for all stock awards (can be paid out of pocket or by selling some of your stock award during vesting periods).

Cons: Long hours - and they are required. 40 hour weeks do not exist. Expect to work weekends frequently and over holidays. Expect to be available on MS Teams 24/7. You will be rated down if you work 50 hours per week and while others do 60 (even if your work gets done right and on-time). There is no OT pay for salaried employees, and you are expected to work more. Travel - If you are Cape or Hawthorne based and work on Starship - expect to be required to travel to Starbase frequently. If you can find a hotel that isn't dirty or full of bugs, you're lucky. Your other alternative is to stay on site - sharing space with randoms or crammed in to tiny living quarters that frequently have A/C fail or run out of hot water. Schedules - Largely unrealistic, and they know this. The goal is to make you feel the pressure to keep working. Bonuses - Stock portion only paid out if you stay with the company for the next full year (awarded ~April, paid November, not including any long term options which vest over 5-6 year periods). This is the mechanism they use to try to retain you. You will notice that when stocks vest (May/November) a lot of employees leave. If something goes wrong, someone is getting thrown under the bus, even if management was 100% on board with the choices made - or made the choice themselves due to cost/schedule. Many managers who are not technically competent in the areas they oversee - they are there to drive you to work more.

Pros: Some of the most interesting work you will ever do, and you will learn a ton with great people.

Cons: Long hours, but that is expected. The hours are spent on deeply interesting engineering problems.