Pros

The process of interviewing for a vendor role can be very fast, and it is substantially easier than interviewing for full-time. Typically, vendors are hired after only one or two interviews with their direct managers at Microsoft. Offers will usually be given on the same day as the interview.

Cons

I'm leaving this one star review in the hopes that others who are considering joining as vendors can see a different perspective than that presented by staffing agencies or Microsoft. Some people like contracting. It gives you the flexibility to try out different teams and work on a diverse range of products. With that being said, being a vendor at Microsoft has some huge downsides that you should be aware of before accepting an offer. First, you will never truly be part of the team that you are working on. While you will likely be doing very similar work to your full-time colleagues, you will be excluded from many of the crucial meetings that they go to. You will be excluded from team outings. You will be excluded from events such as the company all-hands meeting, which helps you broaden your understanding of why you are designing what you are designing, and you will be excluded from opportunities to network with other teams and advance your career. Many individual managers treat their vendor or contract staff with respect and try to bring them in to the conversation. However, these exclusionary practices are not specific to any team; they are endemic to the company culture as a whole. Second, as a vendor, you will likely be mislead about the prospects for career growth that the role provides. Your staffing agency will likely tell you that "vendors get converted to full-time employees all the time", or that "this is a great networking opportunity". Vendors do get converted to full-time employees - occasionally. But it is exceedingly rare, even for the most talented vendors. Be prepared to watch dozens of interns get hired to be full-time employees after a 2.5 month internship, while you, having worked for 18 months, get passed up for conversion because the team "doesn't have headcount". Third, you will never really have design ownership over the feature areas that you are working in. Contractors are expected to do the technical or "boring" work that full-time employees either won't do or don't have the skills to do. You won't really own any part of the designs that you're working on, you're just expected to do the grunt work of implementing someone else's ideas. Have an idea for a new feature or improvement of your own? Be prepared to watch another designer take over the project from you. The culture at Microsoft seems to be very much "once you're in you're in", where under-performing employees can coast through their job for years at a time with very few negative consequences. Because of this, the need for more vendors is exacerbated, and yet very few of them end up being hired. Furthermore, there is a real class divide between FTEs and vendors. You either have a blue badge or an orange badge, which you must wear visibly at all times, which means that you can instantly spot whether an employee is FTE or a vendor. Vendor's emails have a "v-" appended to the front, so that whenever you set up a meeting or send an email, the recipients will know that it was a vendor who created it, and it's therefore not as important to attend. Interested in taking the Connector or getting discounts at the company store? Forget about it. Those benefits are for full-time employees only. A few other things you should know before becoming a vendor or contractor at Microsoft: - You can only work for 18 months at a time, before being required to take 6 months off - You are not eligible for any of the significant benefits that FTEs get - Depending on the agency that you work for, you may get paid time off, but only after working a certain number of hours. Sometimes, that number of hours only comes after you have finished your contract. - Depending on your agency, you will not get paid holidays off. I write all of this with the caveat that some people are perfectly happy being a vendor. Take 6 months off to travel after your contract ends. Try out different teams. If you like being a heads-down worker and having no meetings on your calendar, being a vendor is for you. If you are thinking of being a vendor, I would highly encourage you to reconsider. If you have a full-time offer somewhere else, you will probably be better-served in your career if you take it. If you do accept an offer to be a vendor at Microsoft, I would encourage you to aggressively negotiate your salary, bearing in mind that your agency will take a massive cut (50% to 100%) of the money that Microsoft pays you. them. If you do take the offer, don't count on being hired as a full-time employee. Constantly look for other opportunities. Don't be fooled by the promise of being hired, as this is a carrot held in front of the noses of the company's contingent staff to make them work harder.