Great company to work for...until you don't
Pros
Good culture, genuine focus on work/life balance, great executive leadership and vision, adequate benefits, employee stock purchase plan, good resources given when you are laid off.
Cons
Business silos, frequent changing of direction and focus within the BUs and lack of coordination between BUs, suspect sustainability in the long term. I always loved feeling like part of the team at VMware. I was there 5 years and felt valued and supported. I never had a bad annual review and by most measures was going above and beyond. Our team was periodically recognized as doing excellent work and our skills were absolutely unique in the company. I would have given a Glassdoor review similar to others you see indicating "no negatives I can think of at this time" …but then I fell victim to January layoffs. I waited a full year from being laid off to do this review so I would do it for the right reasons. There was no reason given other than "restructuring" as others have indicated in their reviews. My guess is that VMware thinks of its employees as all living in the Bay Area where jobs are plentiful. It took me 7 months to find another good job and it was very hurtful to my financial situation. Any goodwill I had for VMware was obviously damaged and I would warn others who are considering VMware that you are at risk of being layed-off as a matter of course rather than based on your performance. I feel I also should point out that VMware uses stock as a part of its compensation to retain talent and after going through a layoff, there is little doubt in my. mind that one of the major goals of the January layoffs is to recuperate your stock (for many of us six-figure + amounts of stock). It is no coincidence that layoffs happen at a time that immediately precedes the vesting date of stock. As an example, I would have started vesting less than 30 days after my stated last day of work and every person I talked to affected by the January “restructuring” were in the same boat. Another important thing to understand is when you are let go by VMware, you are told that the company will give you resources to hopefully get rehired - which they do. However, I can tell you I wasted a lot of time applying for jobs internally at VMware and based on the behavior of the hiring managers, I am convinced the burden of my stock was a consideration and put me to the bottom of the queue rather than feeling like my extensive knowledge of VMware and my solid track record wold be a plus. People I was friendly with wouldn't even give me the time of day and I was nothing but discouraged by people when I would reach out. I certainly bear fault for not looking outside the company more those first couple of months but I would not recommend spending significant time on those efforts if you find yourself in a similar situation. I would be particularly careful about joining VMware's bloated corporate marketing team.
