Pros
1 ~ Many would tell you the best thing about Fidelity is the people you work with and I agree. I have made several life-long friends and look forward to seeing them every day. Asking around you will find many people also found their significant others at work as well. 2 ~ Upward mobility and job opportunities. I may be biased from working at the Westlake campus where there are over 6000 jobs but it is also relatively easy to move to other locations within the company. There was a time years ago when it might have felt like you had to go to Boston to move up in the company but those days are gone and there are many great leadership positions throughout the country. 3 ~ Brand recognition you can be proud of and sleep well at night. Fidelity is a discount broker so not ripping people off with high loads or fees. They did not get caught up in the mischief so many other firms did with the mutual fund scandals or financial crisis.
Cons
The best things about Fidelity are also the worst things about Fidelity. 1 ~ If you end up in the wrong department with the wrong boss your life can be a living hell. Fidelity is very liberal in its HR policies which can be good but also means they let things fester for a long time before taking action. There is a percentage of people that will take advantage of this and especially if you are on a small team you may end up constantly covering for a weak link. 2 ~ It is an American dream to start in the mail room and work your way up to VP someday and that is totally possible at Fidelity. In fact, it may be a bit too easy. It is completely common to attend leadership meetings and hear from senior executives "I started on the phones just like you!" Well, that is fine once in a while but at some point you do want people leading you to actually have some training and experience. Fidelity is full of hundreds maybe thousands of Directors, VP's and SVP's that started on the phone "just like you" and it shows. 3 ~ Fidelity has managed to stay out of the news but there are plenty of unsavory things they do behind the scenes. They are currently very worried about the Department of Labor proposed Fiduciary Rule. Their current employer benefits business model is already unethical but if the rule is enacted will be illegal as well. It has long been a major IRA rollover sales lead source to take advantage of relationships with employers to gain access to employees. Fidelity is the world's largest 401k record-keeper and should this lead source be taken away it will be a huge hit to their personal investing sales model in which two thirds of the new assets are from internal rollovers. The Fidelity brokerage business would be nowhere near what it is today without having taken advantage of these workplace business relationships.