Google is fun, quirky, smart, cool, inspiring. But it can still just be a job.
Pros
The prestige. What can I say--it's kinda cool the reaction it stirs when you tell people you work for Google. It's like that first time you used it, and got just the right result on the first try--very satisfying. Free food. It's great not to have to worry about feeding yourself, and the food and snacks are fantastic in New York. Smart people. If you're on the product/engineering side of things you'll work with some of the sharpest people in the industry. Most have stellar academic records and are just plain brilliant. If you're on the sales side, it's a different story, not that there are not plenty of bright, talented sales people. It's just a different kind of intelligence and not as prevalent. Cool products. It's awesome to watch the new products roll out, and to test them while they're in development.
Cons
It's become a very large company with a lot of the bureaucratic trappings that come with growth. Google deliberately has a very high failure rate for products, so occasionally you can love an idea or product and not see it come to fruition fully. It seems like the attention span is short, and sometimes products that could be successful are prematurely shut down. Career guidance can be spotty. They purport to be very concerned with career development, but moving to another team can be like pulling teeth. I think there are a lot of arrogant people at Google, but perhaps that's how every big, popular company is or that's how really smart, talented people are. I've heard it's worse at other companies actually which makes me terrified to ever leave Google.
