I’ve worked at Microsoft for about 7 years and left on my own. I haven’t witnessed any layoffs or job cuts while there, but there is a lot of ‘silent’ layoffs happening – meaning that there are some open positions that never get filled or people are counseled out and their spots remain open.
I was pretty much fed up with the management layer at MSFT, as there is a ton of legacy guys who are miliking their compensation and do very little. There is a ton of VPs who float around and have no understanding of the time it takes to do a project – they will just hand down arbitrary deadlines at the cost of creating a good and quality product. So, what happens? The key and necessary functionality gets cut last minute, or you will end up working long nights and endless weekends complete your tasks on time…
So, they knew from the get go that we did not have enough time but still they kept their top-down plans and never developed a bottom-up plan – who suffers? Quality and customers! I’ve had enough of that and will gladly continue to work in my 11 people company where I know all employees and can understand how I make an impact.
Good luck to you all – Microsoft is a great company, and it’s a great experience to have, but I’d suggest that you spend a few years there and then move on.