Microsoft Software Development Engineer In Test (SDET) II reviews

Senior management are clueless about the direction the product is heading, no vision of where to go expect copy other company's ideas. It's always: "If they do something, we must do it too." It's never: "We should do this before anyone else." Work environment is very political, many decisions are based not on performance but just who's in power and who likes who. Lots of dependency and repetition, start a project, finish, then scrap it, then start again! Review process is horrible, forces people to be in lower 10%, which makes mangers come up with excuses to put you lower in the scale. And if you ever get on that list, good luck trying to convince your managers you don't belong, best to start looking for a job immediately. This is an old, outdated company full to politics and people who just care about climbing the corporate ladder instead of delivering good software. Oh, and if management ever makes a mistake, ICs watch out! You will be on the chopping block!

The compensation is not the greatest in the world. If you have a family the health benefit will compensate for it otherwise for sure you will find it that your peer at other company is making more money that you. Sometimes at work we have way too many meetings, which make it hard to get anything done. Some of the more senior testers are just pain not competent.