Company: Microsoft
Date: 2014-10-18
Overall rating: 4/5
Employment status: former
Experience level: Senior

I was privileged to work at Microsoft for the past 12 years as an FTE, and as a contractor for 2 years prior to that.
Pros: The benefits package can't be beat. Also, the pay is really good, with nice merit increases and bonuses every year (if you deserve them). A recent improvement was changing the performance review system to no longer include the bell curve. There are lots of opportunities for growth, and if you don't like the team you're on or are looking for a change, there's usually another position at Microsoft you can jump to (and it's encouraged).
Cons: For me, it was the rapid and constant change in recent years. It seemed like our team re-orged every six months to a year, or we lost people due to layoffs and didn't hire anyone in their place. As a result, the work those people were doing had to either be spread out across the team or just dropped. Also, you never feel really safe; performance or seniority doesn't seem to matter in layoffs.... Also, our team direction seemed to be constantly changing, and in later years, the leadership became micro-managers. Everything had to be signed off to the point that the leadership team became a bottleneck.