Pros
Compensation and senior management are very good, most of the executive members have been with the company since the beginning. Bonuses were better each year and the company grew at a steady but controlled pace. The culture in the office was a positive one and I made good friends with most people in the office. Socials and outside the office get togethers were positive experiences. Benefits were solid and a reasonable cost to employees. In the Wilmington office there is a free gym and a cafeteria with decent food. Even after leaving the company I still keep in touch with multiple colleagues.
Cons
After the MLIM merger, BlackRock lost opportunities to promote from within as there were just too many employees. Princeton sucked the life out of other office, forcing employees in NY and Wilmington to work harder to compensate. Overnight, these same employees had to do more work while the larger number of employees in Princeton continued their lackluster output. After the merger, all original employees of BlackRock felt that it immediately became harder to be promoted and the small company feel vanished into a pile of bureaucratic paperwork and meetings. I left to explore a more interesting opportunity that I felt would not have been possible.