Pros
The only good thing about State Street is the benefits package. There are a lot of solid options.
Cons
Think of every bad stereotype of working for a corporation, and you've got State Street. The company doesn't care about its employees (though they pretend to, of course). It's next to impossible to actually develop a career - the best you can do is make endless lateral moves. Promotions are decided by senior managers who are too far above the candidates to even know who they're promoting. I once witnessed a c-suite executive state in a town hall meeting, "If you haven't gotten a promotion, you just haven't worked hard enough," which is completely inappropriate, offensive, and totally out of touch with how things actually work in his company. Pay is far below industry standard, to the point that a recruiter once burst out laughing when I told him what my bonus was. They will make any possible excuse to minimize or completely eliminate your annual 2% raise and tiny bonus. I have listened to Jay Hooley talk about great annual results, announce a 25% dividend increase and a $600 million share buyback, and then, in the same breath, tell his employees that no one will get a raise this year because there isn't enough money for it. Also, due to this same "lack of money," critical and unfinished projects around the company will be underfunded or have their budgets completely eliminated. But at least the shareholders got theirs. There is no internal culture; people are miserable and either resigned to a lifetime at State Street or looking to leave. There is an annual quota of layoffs. Every single year the board decides how many people they're going to fire, and the layoffs get distributed across the company, with every group required to fire their share. Of course, annually this is described as an unfortunate measure the company didn't want to take, but it's very much a part of yearly planning. Work-life balance is highly dependent on where you work and to whom you report. Infrastructure is a joke, with employees forced to work on computers 10+ years old and no way to replace them. The management committee endlessly talks about things like innovation, corporate culture and the new "The Way Ahead" campaign, while everyone down in the trenches know none of it has any meaning and will lead to absolutely nothing. Do not work for this company.