Company: Apple
Date: 2015-07-12
Overall rating: 4/5
Employment status: current
Experience level: Junior

Mechanical Quality Engineer
Pros: Great products, some of the smartest people you will ever get to work with, cutting edge technologies - this is the stuff text books are written about. Very few companies can claim to execute to the minute details that Apple does. Nothing short of perfection is good enough and even then some more is expected. There is a reason the products are so good, reliable, aesthetically beautiful...almost like a perfect work of art - its all the smart minds and hard working people behind it. You will learn a ton of stuff in a very short period of time.
Cons: ZERO ZERO ZERO work life balance. The day you sign your offer letter, lock away your personal life only to be be claimed after you quit Apple again. The work culture, esp in Operation is extremely fast paced and  demanding and you got to be on you A game non stop day in day out. 12 hr days are lean, 15 hr days are frequent, somewhere in between is the norm. While travel initially seems to be on par with other operations / consulting jobs, you should prepare for the disruption it brings to your social or family life as it is very frequent and intermittent. While there is a lot of lip service and Sheldonesque sympathy about work-life balance, the basic culture is simple - its a privilege to get a job at Apple, so stop whining and get on with it. It can be a great opportunity if your type is all about getting recharged by the constant stress and chaos and believing in a world changing goal. If not you will burn out very quickly - almost 3 times as fast as another company