Poor management and feels like you're in high school with politics.
Pros
Decent pay -Beautiful area -Good benefits -Large company, so lots of places to go in terms of career advancement and relocation -If you're a nerd like me who loves to learn and is interested in advanced manufacturing and cutting edge technology, the fab is a heaven
Cons
-Contractors and vendors are treated like second class citizens--this bothered me even from an outsider's perspective -Inter-organizational collaboration/relations can be VERY bad -Career advancement entirely at the hand of your direct manager as a technician -Managers imposed arbitrary limits/time-gating on advancement/promotion that aren't even written in policy -Working in a full bunny suit much of the day -Work can be very hard and fast-paced, or very, very slow (most days are very slow). Can't expect much consistency in R&D -Even though the work is largely, blue collar, you will get a lot of office politics and white collar passive aggressiveness in the work culture. You'll find there are many unfriendly, and conniving coworkers. This culture seems to be encouraged. You can end up feeling lonely at work or falling into weird clicks like a high school due to this lack of personability.