Vantaggi
The company is staffed by generally highly intelligent people and it can be fun to work in this environment. The company is lean and fast paced, which can be energizing. There is no fluff work, in general I felt that everything I did was of value and had a direct benefit to the company. There is a general sense of nimbleness. This is a company thats a corvette on a cool summer night, vs. some company's where they are not on the cutting edge, and you feel like you're in a big lincoln on a hot texas highway with no ac.
Svantaggi
The company is lean which is productive, but individuals may have too much work to cover everything. There can be significant stress and tension due to the lack of adequate staffing during some peak periods. Management is so busy they may not pay attention to you, and it can feel as though your contributions are totally unnoticed. The company seems to have a loose reporting structure which I think can create some problems. Sometimes is seems like management does not know where the lines of authority are or who is in charge of what. It can feel like management is a group of feuding warlords vying for power and influence. People are generally nice but there is a bit of a rough and ready "we eat what we kill" type culture. There are times when people in power are not respectful towards you and areas of the office where you are likely to catch a nerf bullet from an obnoxious co-worker. There is a lack of investment in systems and processes, and a general lack of organization in some areas. This creates frustration, stress, and probably some turnover. In two years we went through 3 AP managers. There is window dressing by management at times. They decided to implement a new ERP system but instead of buying the software + staff training package, they purchased only the software to save money. CFO pronounced the implementation a success while we were still scrambling trying to figure out how to operate the software.