Pros
You get to work in a remarkable building with a fascinating history. The architecture is beautiful. As staff, you get to bring friends and family in for free for tours. Free tickets to Terror Behind the Walls. Pay is better than other museums in the area. Other staff are generally very good people with similar interests in art, culture, history, etc. I made a few very good friends.
Cons
-The managers that worked at the site for many years are incredibly passive aggressive, two-faced, ungrateful, uncaring, and make your experience working there miserable. All of them have authority issues-feels like they are the guards and you are the prisoner (like the Stanford Prison Experiment). New GOOD MANAGERS that get hired, usually only last a few months because they get pushed out (or they leave because they can't take it). Managers treat employees like high school students, and act like they know more than you and are better than you, and they destroy your confidence on a daily basis. - Uniform does NOT keep you warm in the winter. Shoes are very important for the job, but due to allowed colors and style you are very limited on what you can wear. Often you will find yourself wearing very expensive shoes or shoes that are not comfortable. - You spend A L OT of time standing and staring at blank walls. You are not allowed to read, use the internet if you are by a computer, or even read materials relevant the to the historic site. Very rarely, you do get to read. If a good new manager is running the site, they will let you read all day because they trust you enough-trust that you are a responsible adult. They trust that if you see a visitor you will pay attention to them. -When it SHOULD be acceptable, you are not allowed to sit down. You end up standing on concrete for almost 8 hours a day sometimes. Often in complete cold or complete heat. When 99% of all staff bring up to management that there is an issue, they get ignored. You feel like you belong to a herd of sheep. - You almost never get recognized or rewarded (sometimes visitors will send an email to compliment you), you never get thanked by management for doing a good job when you do. Some managers or people with a higher position at the site will actually never say hello to you, or say good morning, even though you see each other every single day. That actually makes a huge difference when you work somewhere. -As a visitor Services staff you are not encouraged to grow, nor do you have an opportunity to do so. If you show that you have some interest and potential in moving forward, you get discouraged or ignored.