Microsoft - General Manager Microsoft Employee Review

4.0
Apr 17, 2010
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Microsoft is pervasive in the industry across most segments. This affords a lot of great opportunities to work on a diverse range of technologies. You can work for a couple of years platform or tools and then shift to Azure or cloud computing -- few companies have this simultaneous breadth and depth. Changing positions in the company is relatively easy. At the company there are a number of opportunities to be involved in deloping products that you don't directly work on. Most groups are flexible in terms of the hours/schedule that you work. Most groups at Micosoft have a good work life balance (i.e. the days of death marches are largely over). The benefits are excellent.

Cons

The high level company strategy in areas where Microsoft isn't being sucessful is in constant churn. There is little reason to believe that Microsoft will start being succesful in areas where it is currently challenged. Innovation at the company can be challenging as there are a number of vocal critics to new approaches. Many of these critics have spent their entire careers working at Microsoft which limits their perspective.

Explore other reviews about Microsoft

5.0
Jul 16, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Excellent Benefits and Paid Time Off

Cons

Didn’t allow overtime on my specific project

4.0
Jan 28, 2013
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

1. If you love tech, this is a great place. No doubt you'll talk tech (mostly the MSFT stack) from enterprise to consumer - from PCs to phones to Xboxes - from datacenter to desktop. 2. What were GREAT benefits are now VERY GOOD (took a small step down) but still probably better than you'll find at 99% of large corporations. If you've got family - the value of the benefits is even higher. 401k match is nice. 3. Even with it's struggles MSFT is still a cash printing machine. This means if you can keep your nose clean and do reasonable work, you can have a stable job, pay your bills, feed your family, and not worry (too much) about layoffs. The stock you own likely won't tank, but probably won't go up much either. You'll get a bonus each year and some stock. It's a decent life if you aren't looking to light the world on fire.

Cons

Brand on Your Resume: After many years of losing market share and struggling to be at the front end of innovation and the fact that there's 90,000 employees, don't think MSFT is necessarily going to be attractive on your resume to more agile and smaller companies. Managing Your Career: Make you say this out loud so it registers - 90,000 employees work there. Double that for vendors. It is VERY hard to "stand out" and move up in the company. Don't expect your manager to be much of an advocate or enabler to help you meet your career goals - they are basically trying to survive the stack rank every year too. Not familiar with the stack rank? Check out the 2012 Vanity Fair article called "Microsoft's Lost Decade".

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