Pros
- Relaxed work environment. Good work/personal life balance. - Everyone is friendly, however they will not take new ideas or constructive criticism on-board. - Flexible work hours.
Cons
- Generally, the IT infra is very painfully 80s, esp for IT professionals. ThinkPad laptops, no proper work from home infrastructure. Mail and network downtime every other week. - Serious issues with maturity level or technical competence of technologists. You'll get a 'seniour analyst developer' who doesn't know how to set a classpath. You'll also get people who don't know how to check whether a process is running in an OS. Infra will give you contradicting information -- as an example I was denied an installation on my PC once by an Admin (citing security issues) , but was allowed to download it off the internet later! IT systems are a horror show to say the least. - More emphasis is laid upon staff following instructions rather than encouraging thought-leadership. People spend a lot of time following processes without adding business value. - Every job comes with it's fair share of 'work-place politics' but there is very subtle hectoring by 'Senior' staff. You won't grow in the firm based on your capability and deliverables. - No transparency -- management and staff are out-of-sync. - If you're a technologist, look elsewhere if you don't want to get choked.