Pros
-Solid CEO and leadership. They took care of us during the pandemic and their track record is great for taking care of employees, whether adding a quarterly 4-day weekend to prevent burnout, energizing employees during quarterly earnings calls, or making sure layoffs do not occur here. -Transparency. In line with the previous point, you have access to most things in NVIDIA. You can learn about anything you want in the company, supercharging your learning. Leadership also communicates exactly what's going on in the company. -Flat hierarchy. You don't know everyone's levels and they don't matter too much. You can do work beyond your level if you prove yourself. You're a few levels away from Jensen and see his emails periodically. -Interesting, impactful work. We work on tools that power the world. Projects here have real impact and solve problems that have not yet been solved. It's a powerhouse for that kind of work and you can easily find it. -Startup spirit. Many projects here feel like startups with a lot of runway. NVIDIA invests in R&D, so we have a lot of multi-year projects like that here. Working on those projects is fun and teaches you so much, and your downside risk is low. Even if the project fails, the company repurposes the learnings and tries to see what can be done with it before helping you shift elsewhere. -Invests in its people. Even if you're not happy or performing on a team, the company tries to see if you would be a better fit elsewhere. NVIDIA invests in its people and treats us well. Of course, every team is different, so one not being a fit doesn't mean another one is not. They encourage managers to focus on the company, not any one team, so you get support in this process if you need to move. Having this kind of mobility internally is really valuable. -Great work-life balance. Company holidays, 4-day weekends, work flexibility, and unlimited PTO help a lot here. Every team is different and this is up to you to use, but the top-down approach of encouraging time off and being aware of burnout (plus trying to manage it) feels really supportive. -Great benefits. Student loan repayment, solid healthcare plans, generous time off, 401k matches, WFH office stipend, ESPP, and more. The company checks what's on the market and aims to be competitive with the top companies. Many of the individual benefits are competitive with the few companies in the space who offer them, so taken together, they're really nice.
Cons
-There's inertia to getting rid of poor management. I've heard several folks leave teams or the company over bad management, even in cases where they tried to report it up. I love that NVIDIA is so invested in its people and wants to keep us here, but we need to find a way to balance that with making sure that managers don't create bad working conditions or cause a project to fail and waste company resources.
