Working at Microsoft

A pretty good summary of working at Microsoft. I particularly agree with his comments on managers, both in the sense that there are too many of them and they get in the way, and in the sense that there's very little review or consideration of people skills in hiring managers. Most companies have the reverse problem: managers have nothing _but_ people skills (if even that), and they have no concept of the actual work being done. Microsoft (and now Google, incidentally) have the reverse problem: engineers tend to be the ones promoted to managerial positions, and consequently they have a very good grasp of the products and the technical issues, but they have _no_ idea how to deal with group dynamics or the fact that their reports are, you know, people.

Probably my other biggest gripe with being an employee at Microsoft is that there's no incentive in the review and compensation structure for group achievement. Everything's way too individual-focused, and consequently employees are basically pitted against each other in various ways. It's stupid.

But, overall, Microsoft really is a great place to work. I swear. Every group is different, and a lot of groups don't have these problems.