Pros
You will both learn and understand the meaning of workplace inequality in a fast-paced and hostile work environment.
Cons
The microbiology department is treated as though they are a stain on the company, and the manager refuses to say anything less than "everything's fine" when questioned by their superiors or given unrealistic expectations. Meanwhile, a criminally understaffed department, of whom supposedly are bordering being "overstaffed" struggles to make ends meet and gives exhausting amounts of effort. The injuries that you WILL sustain will be minimized and you will be aggressively gaslit about them. You will be asked to come forward with questions or concerns about the general day-to-day, only to be told that essentially your problems are not problems at all. You will learn very quickly that advancement is based solely on extreme favoritism as there are certain individuals who advance and receive praise for doing the absolute minimum of what is required of them, as evident per the constantly revised promotional structure just before each round of announcements. These individuals have been and will be promoted over others of the same level who produce much higher quantities of quality work, much like a bird raising the chick of a cuckoo that has already evicted that native offspring. If you do not fall into this category, then you will be fed an amalgamation of whatever minor negative aspects you may have encountered in the preceding year, quite often as a result of poor schedule planning and the lack of time given to you for your tasks. The supervisors are drowning in their own mediocrity and have no answer for the vast majority of questions you will have about policies and procedures. Consistently "too busy" to see to the conclusion of their own tasks, they will gleefully "delegate" their work to others while proceeding to have extensive and colorfully detailed conversations about their personal lives with people from either their own department, or employees from neighboring departments that wish to "delegate" their own work as well. Typically, this would be made-up for by maintaining adequate communication with their subordinates, however those very subordinates more often than not learn of policy changes by implementing the former, only to then have a problem arise with their name attached. On that note, changes are reaction-based instead of proactive, with countless individuals trying to warn them about upcoming issues that could easily be avoided, but management seems bent on dealing with mountains instead of molehills. You can give years of genuine effort, and you will be gaslit until the very end while your supervisor looks on you with disingenuous dead eyes and says they had no idea you felt a certain way. Conversely, anyone you ask will confirm that the department is volatilely toxic. Whether discharge is honorable or dishonorable, staffing announcements must be forced out by those that bore witness to the departure. This has been the most psychologically defeating job I have ever had the displeasure of suffering through, and the long-term ramifications on employee's mental health will take years to overcome. However, microbiology is not the only department where these issues permeate. The entirety of the company runs on this logic where weaponized incompetence runs rampant. To summarize, this company can only be personified by a sinking canoe with one person bailing water while two others bring more in for the one to bail. At that point it is up to the bailer to jump out before they all reach the waterfall.