Vantaggi
Have worked there 7 years in two US offices in a variety of projects. -Well connected internally, feels small for a big company -Good global network, collaboration and info-sharing is encouraged -Most staff are competent and kind -Big diversity of projects/types -Some cool, high-profile projects -Good degree of employee freedom to pursue interests -Trying to walk the walk in terms of environmental sustainability, community engagement, and equity commitments -Employee trust ownership structure and leadership rotations/time-limits means there's some protection against individual bad leaders -Annual profit share (not guaranteed but almost always comes through) -Benefits are good in the US -Some technical teams are actually achieving gender parity, though race/ethnicity parity has a long way to go
Svantaggi
-Like much of the AEC industry, long hours are the norm, and workaholics tend to go farther faster in terms of promotion -As a large company, people who don't advocate for themselves can get steamrolled, pigeonholed or put on projects they don't like ... Self-starters and extroverts do much better here than introverts -High ideals come down from upper leadership but implementing them into the day to day isn't done well -Individual experiences can vary a lot depending on your supervisor and office location, some are much better than others ... most staff I've known who've left had a poor supervisor to blame -Not good at providing promotion pathways for people who aren't management material (e.g. "just" designers or technical experts) ... management and business development is really the only way to advance and some staff get stuck for years as a result -Some implicit UK superiority/bias