Company: Microsoft
Date: 2008-04-21
Overall rating: 5/5
Employment status: current

Happy but worried.
Pros: I have a young and growing family so the number one reason I liked the idea of working for Microsoft was the health benefits. Microsoft is big enough to write it's own health plan. There are a few different options, but the default plan is nothing out of pocket for a 100% coverage. No deductions. No copayments. Not even for prescriptions.

Free drinks - we have almost all the coke and pepsi products, plus some tasty sparkling water choices and a full line up of milk and juice.

The salary is fair for a fresh-out-of-school employee working in this expensive area. Other forms of compensation include big morale budgets for every team, stock awards (not options), and potential for annual bonuses equaling 20% of your annual salary.

Microsoft appears mean on the outside because of the aggression of our executives, but down in the drenches where the products are built, everyone is just excited to be a part of something big and cool. The passion and excitement of everyone about the stuff we're doing is invigorating and makes it exciting to come to work. I work in the Office group and we're confident in our products and are exited to see them used worldwide.
Cons: One word: Traffic. Seattle traffic is horrendous. A twenty mile commute is about an hour commute each way. That may be common for other big metros but it's annoying to me.

Three words: Real estate prices. In 2007, the median price in Redmond Washington for homes was over 650 thousand. Granted some of those are really nice and have a good bit of space. But I moved from a place where the same sized place cost half of that. Anywhere within a 30 minute commute to Microsoft will cost 450K+. The costs are such that the low income people are being driven out of the area and the medium income people are becoming the low income people because they can barely afford a 300 thousand dollar condo 45 minutes away from where they work.