Gonna have an internship? This is my opinion. - Software Development Engineer In Test (SDET) Microsoft Employee Review

4.0
12 June 2008
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Pros: As an intern: Great benefits (Geared towards college students, which basically means free stuff like mini fridges, shirts, zunes, etc). As far as DevDiv is concerned (Developer Division), I was very happy with how my teamed worked, and treated interns. Did their best to help you learn, such as even sending interns to conferences (which I was quite surprised about). If I had to do it again, I would defiantly accept the offer. What was really awesome was working on a project that would actually get released to millions of users, which is something that can't usually be said for most places. The random events that they host for interns is the best part. Make sure to go to as many as you can.

Cons

Cons: Hide what it is really like to interns (which makes sense, but still...). Horror stories are heard about teams who treat their interns badly, or give them projects that are basically useless. Also pressure you about taking an offer at the end of the internship (which you want to be paid 10,000 dollars less is not a very good idea). Also is prevalent that they have an email discussion list that was made to distract interns from doing work. Kind've backstabbity in my opinion. Not very impressed with the idea. If they would fix a lot of these issues, it would be much better.

Explore other reviews about Microsoft

5.0
7 June 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Interesting and varied work. Seasonality to the job allows for rest period

Cons

Less stability than there used to be makes people afraid to take risks

4.0
28 Jan 2013
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

1. If you love tech, this is a great place. No doubt you'll talk tech (mostly the MSFT stack) from enterprise to consumer - from PCs to phones to Xboxes - from datacenter to desktop. 2. What were GREAT benefits are now VERY GOOD (took a small step down) but still probably better than you'll find at 99% of large corporations. If you've got family - the value of the benefits is even higher. 401k match is nice. 3. Even with it's struggles MSFT is still a cash printing machine. This means if you can keep your nose clean and do reasonable work, you can have a stable job, pay your bills, feed your family, and not worry (too much) about layoffs. The stock you own likely won't tank, but probably won't go up much either. You'll get a bonus each year and some stock. It's a decent life if you aren't looking to light the world on fire.

Cons

Brand on Your Resume: After many years of losing market share and struggling to be at the front end of innovation and the fact that there's 90,000 employees, don't think MSFT is necessarily going to be attractive on your resume to more agile and smaller companies. Managing Your Career: Make you say this out loud so it registers - 90,000 employees work there. Double that for vendors. It is VERY hard to "stand out" and move up in the company. Don't expect your manager to be much of an advocate or enabler to help you meet your career goals - they are basically trying to survive the stack rank every year too. Not familiar with the stack rank? Check out the 2012 Vanity Fair article called "Microsoft's Lost Decade".

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