Pros
The MathWorks has a relaxed work environment for the most part. You'll see people coming and going at all hours of the day, and it's nice to know that no one is sitting there with a stopwatch timing your hours as it can be at some companies. Employees are left to run their own days and this level of respect is appreciated. Work life balance is top notch at this company. I hear alot of complaints about the pay, but I would have to say that it is fair. You're not going to get rich working here, but for the level of responsibility, the pay is about where it should be in my opinion. The vacation policy at the MathWorks is also great. 3 weeks plus 3 personal days to start and that increases to a maximum of 5 weeks +3. Taking the time is easy too unlike some other companies. There used to be a liberal working from home policy which was great as it allowed you to take care of the odd thing that came up here and there. Recently though that has been changed and now WFH is strongly discouraged. This was one of the greatest perks in my opinion and it's loss deals a big blow to the attractiveness of working here. Hopefully the lockdown will relax in the future.
Cons
I find that of all the things the MathWorks values, creativity and hard work are not always among them. I'm willing to admit that this might be department or even manager specific, but I have certainly seen my share of people promoted to high profile positions when their level of work had been demonstrably low and their achievements had, at best, been efforts to make themselves look effective. If you work here, it seems you are better off shirking your actual duties and instead working to get your name out there. Seriously, no one seems to care if you do that instead of your job. People can and do get away with doing nothing all day long. With respect to creativity, management pays lip service to it, but anyone trying to innovate is met with some pretty stiff resistance. People here like things the way they are. Unless you happen to land in a pretty lucky position, this job can be a resume killer. The MathWorks suffers pretty badly from NIH Syndrome and so nothing you work on even exists in the outside world. If you are working ON designing all these in-house tools, it's great experience. If you are working WITH them, you are learning a skill that is useless anywhere else you go. It's worth watching out for if you work here.