Pros
You get left alone by managers. Some decent and genuine people.
Cons
Let's see here. First, to be clear, I was with federal services, so I was a federal contractor. We entered a period in which we had to rebid for a contract. Normal. Happens with regularity in federal work. In fact, you might go so far as to say people know when they have to rebid! (because they do). Well, when time for us approached, the entire joint took the air of a chicken slaughterhouse. Headless chickens everywhere. Leadership said initially, it will be two months! Meanwhile they stopped hiring people, stopped doing travel, stopped doing everything that they couldn't charge to the client (save for a few things that I'll get to later). I don't want to write an essay, but my point is that no one was prepared. What was supposed to be 2 months ended up being almost 8. This place is gaga about diversity. They will literally pay out a higher bonus the more diverse someone is. Maybe that's normal, but it is repugnant. They want half of the workforce to be women by 2020 or something like that. They also want many more women managers. Men, who lack diversity cred, think about what this means for your promotion potential at the company. Unqualified managers. A mentor pointed out to me that a manager can be very successful and not be a leader. Boy is that true. The only "leaders" are executives. I don't mean that in what I experience, I mean that I never heard a manager be referred to as a leader. For what I said in the second paragraph, you get some really, really bad managers. People who hit the promotion elevator, not by being good at their job and capable of managing a group of people well, but for other reasons. And since they're not terribly great at their job and bad at managing, they stay at the company. Weird diversity oriented programs. I've never seen so many special events and days set aside at a company for diversity events as I have at AFS. They won't spend AFS money on their employees, but they will hire out fancy halls for IWD. Unwillingness to develop technical skills. Sure, sometimes the best way to learn a program is "hands on" but when the "hands on" system is live and essential, should you really have people figuring out things as they go along? If you ask for a book or training you will get told that they either don't have budget, or that you can ask and they'll see what happens. Meanwhile peers you work with get sent to classes. And speaking of books, people have a weird hang up about not using them. Lack of commitment to people. Friends of mine moved hundreds of miles and across several states to work where we did. Oh look we lost the contract and we knew we were, and now you're "on the bench" but don't worry! AFS takes care of people who are on the bench. As long as they're above entry level, that is.