Pros
Big Four Firm, Challenging and engaging work, Learn a lot very quickly, 5 weeks PTO, work with teams staffed with intelligent and hard working professionals, two office events each year (summer and holiday event), form great relationships with your team, team lunches (depends on team)
Cons
Work life balance, high stress environment, high expectations, limited coaching/teaching (must teach yourself if you want to perform well/survive), Management does not act on criticisms (does not become more efficient), lack of open communication below upper MGMT and lower associates, Upper management does not work late with the team (if team works until 2 am the Manager leaves around 10 and Partner will usually leave at 6, so they are not aware of all the work being performed), some employees have been pressured to eat hours to make budget look better. "Great Learning Experience" means you are going to work A LOT and it will be a mess, so don't have any plans for the next month or so. Feel uncomfortable to give negative feedback or constructive criticism to upper management for fear of retaliation (being moved to worse client or sent to another city to work more hours/additional busy seasons). Teams can be understaffed resulting in way more hours than other teams for no reason other than upper management doesn't want to "hurt the budget", so these employees have to work until 2 am in busy season (80-90 hour weeks) while other teams work until 10 (60-70 hour weeks).