Microsoft Software Development Engineer In Test (SDET) I reviews

Too many processes Health benefit is changing People get pushed to show visibility and that dips into your time and effort in assuring product quality

Your experience, performance, and opportunities are heavily determined by your direct manager's support, and indirectly, your skip-level manager. Regardless of whether you do good work or bad, the process is highly political. If you have a bad relationship with your manager, even if it isn't "your fault", you're set up for failure. It is, unfortunately, a pre-requisite that you manage this relationship first before your actual work performance, because little else matters if your manager does not go up to bat for you. For me, I was lucky to have supportive direct managers. For many of my peers, however, I've seen very poor managers and there is little the system can do to protect employees from bad managers. Crap shoot at times.