Yahoo

I very recently left Yahoo to join Google.

I have to say that my 2.5-year experience at Yahoo under Marissa Mayer has been nothing but awesome. In particular, it had several simple benefits that even Google, my new employer, does not have.

For example, at Yahoo, they used to not only have a company shuttle for commuting but also paid for my VTA via a Clipper. Google does not provide for VTA.

Yahoo gave me a free Mi-Fi device, which was super cool. They also gave me a phone and paid for the entire unlimited data plan.

The food at Yahoo is amazing, and for me in particular, they had a juice bar that I miss very much. You can basically tell them to put together any combination of fruits and vegetables to make any smoothie or juice you want. Google does not have that, so I miss it for sure.

The office spaces at Yahoo are really aesthetically pleasing and very well-lit. At Google, my current office has almost no light.

The culture at Yahoo is amazing, with regular company-wide events where celebrities like Jennifer Lawrence or the Guardians of the Galaxy, or sports stars come over, etc. Lots of awesome parties.

They have a weekly sit-down between the entire company and the CEO along with all her execs, where we could ask them any questions we want.

The company has a lot of successes that get hidden by the decline of Yahoo's old businesses, but if you are an employee in one of Marissa Mayer's focus areas, then it's a really awesome place to be.

There is so much negative media scrutiny on Yahoo that it made it really hard to hire new, good people. It also made existing employees feel uneasy about Yahoo's future, making all those negative opinions become a self-fulfilling prophecy.