Microsoft reviews

-Annual review system forces bottom 20% each year to be eventually managed out of the company, making for an extremely stressful workplace -Microsoft appears to be in the process of laying off or otherwise turning over 20% of the workforce over the next 3 - 5 years -Technical skills acquired are Microsoft centric and not transferable to other companies -Performance ratings are too dependent on the immediate manager (leaving you at the mercy of manipulative managers) -The work environment is extremely political, requiring a lot of maneuvering to get ahead, and there is no teamwork -All product strategy is ultimately based on defending the Windows business, so there is no innovation (just being a fast follower) -All products are perenially focused on catching up with competitors to prevent marketshare erosion (e.g. Windows 8 to combat iPad, Office "Online" to combat Google Apps, Windows Server to combat VMWare, etc.) -Management is focused more on building empires for themselves, and not on doing the right things for Microsoft -Medical benefits will be severely cut back starting in 2013 (moving to Health Savings Account, etc.) -Base salary is not competitive with rest of tech industry -Stock has gone nowhere in 10+ years :-)

Terrible, pathetic senior leadership. These people don't know what they are doing. Ripped apart the org, and then ripped the CSAM and account team away from all of their customers, just leaving us to deal with the mess of REALLY pissed off customers. Tell us to give them the "Red Carpet Experience". What a joke. Can't even travel to visit your customers either, while AWS & Google are sending teams to customers weekly. Bonuses and Merit have been slashed this year while Microsoft had its best year. I'm saying 5% and 1%. Slashed stock bonus too. Reviews are based on their "Growth Mindset" BS. Your manager can rank or tank you. The worst micromanagement I have ever seen. Will lie and then gaslight you. And put the lies in your review to tank you even further - in your career there and your livelihood. You complain and it goes nowhere.