Pros
Nowadays it is a good environment to develop your pharma industry career but not to start. PPD is also a safe place as PPD will be very reluctant to fire you even if you really screw up. Safe for pregnancy. PPD is a very good place to learn and master organizational and time management skills (through trial and error) as the timelines that are given are rarely realistic.
Cons
PPD wil not teach you quality or give you proper training. So if you are ambitious it is better to start your career with some pharma/biotech company (producer). At PPD you will hear a lot about quality and timelines but you will not receive any serious training on either. Timelines are taken sometimes to absurdities which makes it impossible to deliver quality. A state of emergency is an every day business while the senior management fails to acknowledge that emergency when is constant ceases to be perceived as emergency. Not a place for serious professionals as achievements are not recognized and emphasis is placed on strict division of tasks which in turn inhibits professional growth. Too much of corporate pep talk in 1:2:1s with line managers. Line managers not capable of proposing content-related solutions. Senior management fails to train properly junior management concentrating on employing line managers to actual clinical related tasks.