Pros
Not everything is bad at Cognizant. You would love the job, no doubts. But, there is no such a thing called growth at cognizant.
Cons
So many of them. 1.)They would be first to visit your campus and they would pay you the least. Fine, pay doesnt matter initially. 2.) Then, they even ask you to relocate. No problems with that either as long as they could provide an accommodation even for a single day. But no, you are expected to find your own accommodation from day 1. Fine, getting to find a decent flat in cities like bangalore or chennai is no big deal. But, what about people who are too new to these cities. You find an accommodation somehow, thanks to the good friends. 3.) You start working. You enjoy your work. There ends the good news. You would be at work 12-15 hours everyday. Fine, as long as you are enjoying work. But does that effect your pay. A big NO. 4.) Here comes the best part. You slog. Work hard. Work wonders for the team. You are 1 year old at Cognizant. Any hikes? Well, it so happened that 2006-2007, all companies had to raise their entry-level payscales. So, unfortunately for Cognizant, they had to raise their fresher pays too. STILL BEING THE WORST Paymaster in it's league. What now, a 2006 guy is being paid x, companies rasied pay to 1.7x. We'll make the 2007 entrants pay to 1.5x and we will keep the 2006 guys' pay at x as long as they don't agitate. They agitate and the generous HR raise the pay to 1.5x+5k every year which is almost the same as people who have joined the company 1 year after you have. 5.) Step 3 continues for another year. 6.) 2008 guys come in. Your pay doesnt raise. Add +5k every year. Oh forgot, the yearly revision would add a very gracious 20k (per annum) hike. Wow! 7.) Ok fine. Even so, we have onsite things and promotions. Well, promotions at Cognizant, my dear, would solely be in terms of experience. Meaning, you are eligible for a promotion when everyone else who has more experience than you gets promoted. 8.) The worst of all. Cognizant grows through it's employees money. Meaning, Cognizant could be a 3 bn $ company. But, had it tried to be an employee friendly organization with decent compensation (atleast as much it's peer companies pay), it wouldn't have been a 2 bn $ assets company either. This could be happening in every company. But this is solely my personal review. I am not happy about the company and there it ends. There could be people who agree to my views about the company. There could be people who don't. But, my views are very relevant if you are a NOT A LATERAL hire at Cognizant (meaning recruited from college).