When I first joined, I liked and respected what USG potentially had to offer to the scientific community. I was disappointed as the months went on though. There is an extremely poor work/life balance. Looking back, I would NEVER recommend this job to someone who has children they must look after as this job has poor "core" hours. You have a lucky job if you can leave at 5 or 6 in the afternoon. Most do not. The projects are extremely challenging and though this may be nice sometimes, there is high discontent here as simple issues takes days or weeks to be resolved. I also got the impression many people are hard to just basically get along with in the workplace. Behind the scenes, there is a gossip mill and backstabbing between research associates, though this has slightly improved this past year with newer hires. I have also noticed this workplace has a lot more cliques than other places which basically degrades the morale of the workplace in general as these cliques are not for the best of the company.