Company: Microsoft
Date: 2013-08-22
Overall rating: 3/5
Employment status: current

Times Are Changing
Pros: Great people who believe in the vision, love to talk technology, passionate about changing the world.
Cons: Executive leadership trying to create a "sales culture", using a Walmart model. A byproduct of this approach is a consistent culling of technology-focused individual contributors, in favor of bringing pure sales people in from other companies.

Employee Review system is broken, outdated, and assumes that every team has someone that should be fired. Microsoft is trying to become a "Devices & Services" company, recognizing that devices are very personal. Unfortunately, the devices are designed to push the Windows/Office platform, which is not necessarily what consumers and businesses want anymore. Sometimes "good enough" is good enough.

Management always talks about how much opportunity there is at Microsoft, but they neglect to mention that you must live in Redmond to get it (some exceptions, but for the most part, this is still true.)

Benefits used to be amazing, but with recent changes, employees are forced to become their own adjusters, negotiating directly with care-providers and cross-checking EOB forms for completion/accuracy.