Pros
+ Great location, subsidized parking, free bus pass + Friendly support staff (admins, building security) + Good cafeteria with long hours (8am-6pm) + Very good benefits with tuition reimbursement + Pleasant work environment with flexible hours for most part
Cons
- Absolutely horrible management at every level - The onus is on short term revenue and not one manager has the sense to look at the bigger picture. In the name of short term revenue, one team blew the chance for Helix to be part of the Android stack. A director from the same team pretty much killed off the open source effort that Real had spent years building up. Quality suffers and customers don't come back. - Pay is a joke - Non-technical personnel at various positions including Program Managers, Directors, VP of Technology and heck, even the CEO is not technical enough. - Layoffs every 3 months does wonders to your morale as an employee. The *biggest* problem I have with Real is how they have active hiring on the side (anywhere between 10-30 positions open) as they are still laying people off. This is borderline unethical. The jobs are being to China and India in the name of costs cutting but there are no hiring freezes ever. This is something Real's useless HR needs to learn from their neighbors at Redmond. Again this is a big FU to your employees who have been with you for 4-8 years. - Dependent on advertising and people installing Yahoo/Google/WeatherChannel toolbar to generate revenue. No real products - downsize all you want but without any products, there's no future.
