Horribly oppressive, unprofessional regime
Pros
T-SQL experience. You'll learn to keep your mouth shut. A solid understanding of what you absolutely do not want in an employer. A new/renewed appreciation for the song "Take this job and shove it." If you hate your family, a job at this company will provide many opportunities to put them second to your work. It'll be fun to joke with your colleagues about how they should change the name of the company to "Open Access Training Institute." You will never get fired, no matter what. If you sign up for the in-house fitness class with the CEO, you'll get into the good ol' boy network (as long as you kiss his butt.)
Cons
The following is ALL based on personal experience: You will report to un-trained, inadequate, powerless management. You'll be forced to sign a two-year, non-compete, non-solicitation agreement. Two year!! You will NOT be given an opportunity to have a personal attorney review said agreement. If they discover that you are mildly competent, you will quickly be saddled with more work than you can ever hope to accomplish within the given deadline. You will be doing mandatory overtime (with no compensation.) Project management is hostile at best, especially under pressure (so constantly.) You will quickly be added to an on-call after-hours (24 hr) support rotation, and handed a mandatory company cell phone that MUST be answered ANY time it rings, day or night, even when you're not on call. This cell phone is the crappy flip phone you get for free at any major carrier. You will not be allowed to make or receive personal calls on it. You will not be allowed to place or receive personal calls on your desk phone (if they give you one,) or your personal cell phone while at work. You will not be allowed to eat anything (whatsoever) at your desk. You will be required to badge through a turnstile prior to 07:59:59 each morning. Failure to do so will result in an email from the in-house legal department. You will not be allowed to badge through same said turnstile prior to 04:59:59 each evening. Leaving one second early will result in the same email. If either happens three times in a month, you will be disciplined. Doesn't matter if uou just worked the weekend or all night. You. Will. Be. Disciplined. There are recycling bins all over the campus; these are just for show as everything is just thrown into the same dumpster out back. You will be grouped in with others outside of your department, and will be graded collectively. This collective grade will determine your raise amount, if you get one at all. Worked every weekend last year? Doesn't matter. Bob didn't meet a deadline so no raise for your group. You will receive little to no training on outdated, half-baked technology (good luck putting WebPlus on a resume.) You will spend your days firefighting code that was written on a Saturday and put into production the following Monday, un-tested. When this happens, you will be working in the office until it is fixed. Then you will have a follow up meeting the next day in which you will be chastised. You will develop an eye-twitch (or other nervous tick) from the constant stress due to ridiculously unrealistic project timelines and incompetent "yes man" management. Everything you learned with regard to data modeling in school is null and void at this company. You will roll fully denormalized schemas to production systems constantly. In the event you receive a promotion (likely because the person(s) above you got sick of it and quit,) it will come with a 2% raise and a 90% increase in expectations. The CEO and his Chief General Counsel are a married couple. She weilds an enormous power, and does so like a bank robber in the lobby with an AK-47. If you sign on, stay out of her path as much as possible.
