Pros
Work life balance - flexibility of time. Compensation and benefits Work satisfaction The compensation is amazing. While it's true that there are many companies doing interesting projects, the pay and benefits at Brocade are good. Their offers are almost impossible to turn down. lets you focus on your job with minimum overhead. You can actually spend the majority of your day writing code and not be bothered with administrative paperwork, irrelevant meetings, or any other kind of interference. Most developers meet with their managers to discuss their yearly goals, but that really is the majority of the non-programming responsibilities. So its okay overall.
Cons
Lack of objective criteria for promotion - young people entering the company are not as rapidly promoted, and performance reviews are worse. Decision making is sometimes slow. You need to involve too many people before making a decision. Many products get started, but do not see the light of the day. You do feel the downside of working for a small company because of limited potential for promotion. If the company were growing faster, lot more people will get promoted. Small company also means we do not have matured process. There are some smart people, but most of the folks are followers.