Associate / Lead Technologist / Lead Engineer
Pros
The on boarding (although it has been streamlined over the years) is relatively thorough and helps new hires get adjusted to company culture and expectations. Recently the company has taken steps to offer alternative career paths to those who are less interested in the business development/proposal work and want to focus on more technical/domain specific work where they can utilize their subject matter expertise.
Cons
Like most companies there are things you need to deal with to "navigate" a successful career. Without a decent mentor it will be difficult to know this. Resource Management: The resource management process, on paper, is a great way for the firm to align the skills and interests of their employees to new opportunities once they are not billable. However in the interest of getting billable work quickly employees are urged to be "flexible" so while you may be qualified for a role you may not necessarily be interested in it (doesn't align with your short term or long term career goals, commute is not beneficial for you.....etc). Different management teams will handle this differently but for the most part there is a significant amount of pressure to accept an assignment sooner (rather than continue looking for a better fit) so as to mitigate overhead charging. Also, while employees are encouraged to be the CEO of their own careers the expectation is to work their current assignment through the period of performance. This is a bit conflicting because employees may find a role that is a better fit for them vs their current assignment. Advocacy: Simply put if you do not have a strong advocate in management your pay increase and potential for promotion will be disappointing. This may pose a problem to those who work on client site full time and are limited by how much face to face interaction they can have with management at the local Booz Allen office. High performing individuals with excellent annual reviews (including amazing feedback/reviews from the client) can end up with standard pay increases. If you want to be promoted it needs to be clear to your career manager so that both sides can knowledge the milestones you need to hit for the next level. Just doing good work will not cut it. Again, even if you do both of these things well your efforts can impaired if your brand is not strong with your management.