Pros
Good first job to develop basic professional, analytical, and consulting experience You work with top clients across a range of industries. There is opportunity to work across a range of project types (though too much is still brand tracking). The people are intelligent, nice, and driven. You can form some great friendships here, and your team mates care about you. Salary is now competitive (though could be better) Some company perks (happy hours, group events every trimester)
Cons
Unsustainable work/life balance. Though the average MaPSter is bright and hard working, the culture and managers expect workaholics. You will be tied to your email when you are away from work or on vacation, and by consultant level you start to feel guilty for not looking at work on the weekend. People who are successful at MaPS are motivated for the quality of their work, at the expense of an outside life. This results in embitterment and sad-laughing at your situation among the junior staff. Analysts and Consultants are seen as expendable. Large turnover and are placing many people on performance tracks. The review and advisor process is a crapshoot. Depending on your reviewer/advisor, reviews and promotions can be determined solely by your relationship with a project manager, not taking into account the opinions of your peer team mates. Day to day is not interesting, and you rarely see the impact of your work. 100% of research is surveys, which are boring and outdated. Survey testing will become the bane of your existence. Some projects are just pumping out numbers without thought, which makes the day to day tedious. Too much of the company's portfolio is brand tracking work which are not very interesting or intellectually challenging. Aside from excel, most analysis is done through a program called Marketsight, which no other company uses and does not place you at a competitive advantage. If you're looking at MB Analytics in hopes to get into the Millward Brown/ Kantar/ WPP system, know that management will actively dissuade you, and HR from internally transferring. They are taking on more and more lower profile clients in their attempt to expand, reducing the value of the MaPS offering. Finally, due to the solely quantitative nature of the project, I foresee the market research industry being dominated by deep-learning tech algorithms that will reduce the need for analysts and consultants. If the company is smart they will invest in their internal tech.