Pros
- Plenty of smart, motivated, hardworking, friendly colleagues - this is an excellent group of people, in every department.
- Great place to learn C#/.NET as a developer.
- R&D managers generally give you the autonomy to set your own schedule. You will be treated like an adult. You will not be micromanaged.
- You will have ownership over code/features very early in your career here. You're trusted to make creative and meaningful contributions to the products. If you like having plenty of time to put your head down and code, this is a good place for you.
- Historically the development cycle has been brutal (i.e. pulling long hours for weeks/months prior to release), and some older reviews reflect that. I was around during the end of that era. The R&D infrastructure has since been modified, and there's no crunch time insanity anymore. You'll still be busy, but not unreasonably so.
- Salary is fair.
- Medical/Dental/Vision benefits are excellent.
- I see plenty of people complaining about traffic, but traffic is a non-issue if you live in one of the beach neighborhoods south of La Jolla.
- Lots of social events: happy hours, quarterly parties, team outings, etc.
Cons
- There aren't a lot of professional development opportunities as an engineer outside of your day-to-day work. There have been attempts to organize weekly talks/sessions/seminars/lectures, but they've always fallen through. There are no higher-education subsidies or benefits.
- For such a small company, there's not a lot of transparency.
- No 401k match.
- Remote work opportunities aren't available for most San Diego-based employees.
- Life and Disability insurance are poor.
