Pros

The perks are great as you probably already know. Who can complain about free gourmet food and lots of freebies. But even over the last few years the company's growth has caused many of these once great perks to go downhill (but don't get me wrong the food is amazing). There are so many smart people at Google so if you want a place to learn and find out anything you've ever wanted to know, this is the place for you. People are typically very willing to give you a helping hand any time you have a question. Google also does wonders on your resume of course.

Cons

It's really hard to shine. As the company has grown at an amazing rate, you become a little guy amongst hundreds of strong performers. Even if you're doing well, there's probably somebody else putting in more than the extra effort. By this I mean, so many people work day and night and achieve great things, but for those who have other things going on in their lives it's just hard to compete and be noticed. It's hard to blame managers as they can't reward everybody but it's really hard to maintain a healthy work/life balance.

Advice to Senior Management

Don't try so hard to suck all the free time out of everyone's lives. While it's great that some employees love to contribute extra, it's unfair to punish those who just do a great job during the business day.

The hiring process is also horrible. It weeds out thousands of extremely qualified applicants as it focuses strongly on GPA over real industry experience. Often times the smartest and most applied people are the people who didn't do well in school. Many of the great innovators have not appeared to be the most 'book smart'.