Pros
Working here allows a person to quickly pick up a base of development skills . This is a useful quick stop for new developers who are unsure of themselves and their value. In my opinion, software developers should always check their value in the market to make sure they aren't helping to push down rates at other development companies.
Cons
Young employees are paid extremely low wages. Younger employees do not realize their value and tend to work at Edaptive far longer than they need to in order to be qualified for much higher wages. A principal developer might be paid on par with what they made at other companies, but that does not make them experts on compensation at Edaptive. I received a very large raise when I left. The people who are hired on as principles or team leads might have a different experience as they may have known their value going in. That does not mean that Edaptive doesn't pay less than market for most employees compared to what they would be paid at another defense contractor. I too have worked at many companies and have an opinion that is just as valuable as someone calling other posters stupid. I don't think checking into the market and finding better opportunity is dumb, and I would encourage all employees of any company to go out and check their value at other employers before assuming someone getting paid twice what you are receiving is telling you the truth about compensation at Edaptive or elsewhere. If there are only a few people with good wages out of 50-60, they are outliers. Compensation aside, the work life balance was poor here too. I have worked a couple of years since being at Edaptive and have barely worked overtime at all. I regularly worked extra hours at Edaptive. I was also asked to do odd jobs at Edaptive that had nothing to do with software development. This put people in awkward situations where they were building desks during their lunches for a slice of pizza or two. That is something people do because they feel that if they won't, it might affect raises or how they are treated. Are team leads or principles asked to do this "side" work?? Not from what I witnessed. Not everyone is treated the same. There are a handful of people who are treated decently and appear to be paid enough to keep them around. Most of the development work is not done by these people but by people who typically leave after a year or two because of low pay and working conditions. These people who leave do not deserve to be called stupid merely because they have discovered reality...