You can use the pom.xml as the IntelliJ project file, no need to process it into something else.

you can edit the pom.xml file, and have your project adjusted immediately. intellij will download and add the new jar to the classpath... BAM

intellij is really a much better experience in developing than eclipse. Lots of fit and finish things, also intellij is very keyboard-centric, so whereas eclipse had lots of graphical widgety things, intellij has all your normal day to day stuff fully keyboard accessible. It's the closest to emacs in an IDE I've ever seen.