Vantaggi
Biggest - maybe only? - pro is work/life balance. I work from home several days a week, for no reason other than I want to avoid coming into the office, and that is totally acceptable. Some people arrange their eight hour work day to go from 8am-4pm, 7am-3pm, etc. and that is considered OK, and normal. New mothers are granted generous amounts of maternity leave (6 months+), etc. etc. Of course, it helps that my work rarely take me more than a couple hours to complete - I never spend a full eight hour day on the job.
Svantaggi
1. Randomness: Sounds like a weird complaint, but your entire experience at Booz Allen is a crap-shoot. Some people get promoted after one year, some after several. Some are given the OK to work abroad/relocate geographically/switch teams/etc., some aren't. It's all about what admin team you're place on when you joined. 2. "World view" for lack of a better phrase. Many people at Booz Allen grow up in the DC metro area, go to school there, come work for Booz, and don't understand why anyone else would do differently. I have had a lot of negative reaction to my background (grew up in a different city, went to an Ivy League school, etc.). Some senior management will actually discourage people from pursuing grad school, unless it can be taken locally and/or at night. 3. The work itself: nothing that we do as consultants is truly valuable. Like most government contractors, the goal is simply to get add-on work, not to get the first job done. Many projects drag on for years at a time and are renewed month after month despite a complete lack of results. Booz Allen likes to think that they compete with McKinsey, Bain, and BCG, and that is how they pitch their business, but that is really not the case. Salaries are also much, much lower than these "competitors."