100 Best Companies To Work For 534
Misha writes "Fortune.com is publishing a list of 100 Best Companies to Work for. Quite a few tech companies, with a few semi-startups, like Xilinx, who 'protected its employees from a nasty downturn in the industry by refusing to abandon a no-layoff policy. Workers took a 6 percent pay cut, but the CEO led the way with a 20 percent cut.'"
Hewlett Packard? (Score:5, Interesting)
Carly is driving us directly into the ground... In my humble opinion. When I started 4 years ago everyone I told said "Oooo... I heard thats a good place to work!". I agreed. But it has slid down ever since.
*sigh*
Jason
Where's HP? (Score:3, Interesting)
Another employee-centric company culture falls prey to the narrow-minded concepts tought in today's business schools.
I find this ranking pretty useless (Score:5, Interesting)
% Minorities? % Women? (Score:4, Interesting)
-Vic
Not sure if I like my chances. (Score:3, Interesting)
1,312 New Jobs this last year.
360,000 Applicants...
Uh, thats a
Also:
#63 LensCrafters, while not a tech company, this sounded pretty cool:
"Sunglass Hut, a new sister company, joined this year's Visionfest, where managers and execs donned white gloves, top hats, and bow ties to welcome employees, park their cars, and open doors. "
Re:5. adobe systems (Score:2, Interesting)
About 5 years ago, when I was in college, I interviewed on-campus with Adobe. As part of moving to 2nd round interviews, they specifically asked for my resume in PDF and gave me a free fully copy of Acrobat with which to make a conversion. (it was a copy of Acrobat 3, Acrobat 4 was about to come out so they were dumping free copies of 3.x on students)
Re:hm (Score:5, Interesting)
Labour rights (like not having to work 90 hours straight time, not having to put your hand in a drillpress, unions etc) are things that you will have to GIVE-UP if you intened to be employed in the future... remember, there is always someone more desperate than those in the west... and your Employer would happily exploit them instead of treating you with diginity and respect.
Union vs. labor contractor? (Score:4, Interesting)
Maybe instead of calling it a "union", we should call it an "employee-owned labor contractor" to deal with all that right-wing anti-union propoganda that's been going around for the past 100 years. After all, in the areas where unions are strong (like the construction trades) that's basically what a union is -- an employee-owned labor contractor, where employers drop by the union hall and say "I need 50 bricklayers for a commercial building at 5th and Dunlap" and voila. The workers are trained by the union through an apprenticeship program, and often the worker's pensions and benefits are administered by the union in this kind of setup, making it seem even more like an employee-owned labor contract organization.
So someone correct me if I'm wrong -- can we just call it an "employee-owned labor contractor" and get around that whole "union label" thing ("unions are for blue-collar workers or incompetents") that keeps unions out of the IT industry?
Regarding outsourcing IT to India -- that's already being done, both via the H1B program and directly. Don't believe that refusing to join a union (err, "employee-owned labor contractor") will preserve your job. It won't. Your employer right now, as you read this message, is investigating outsourcing your job to India. You can bank on it, unless you happen to be your own boss.
Re:WHERE'S LINUX (Score:1, Interesting)
Open source companies can't afford to treat their employees well. They're highly-speculative businesses and they have to be willing to lay employees off at the drop of a hat. That doesn't stop them from demanding employee loyalty but it does keep them from returning it.
Do open source and free software work? Sure. Are they economically viable? Sure. Are companies based on them going to prosper? Not unless they're about some product that makes money and isn't about selling software. And they'll never be good companies to work for until they can make a profit.
Re:The Container Store is #2? (Score:2, Interesting)
Even though they run a bit expensive, and are occasionally understaffed, they have lots of neat containers. I particularly like the chrome garbage can (I think it's Dutch) I purchased a couple years back, and they have really neat locking-lid containers made from surgical-grade plastic that handles nuked leftovers without permanent coloring/pocking. Normal tupperware-style plastic containers will, when reheating say leftover taco meat, get all pockmarked and it's really hard (nigh on impossible) to get it back to pre-pocked state. Not these bad boys.
Also, while not entirely anal, I have a tendency towards organization in the fridge, if only so I don't continually waste money on things I already have or should work harder on making last longer.
And I wouldn't go to Spatula City, but I might go to Utensil City.. Gotta love nonstick spaghetti 'hands'.. Good for pasta as well as raising/lowering hard boiled eggs.. And even normal nonstick spatulas wear out eventually, and end up 'grabbing' on omelets and stuff..
PS: is it just me or is slashdot REALLY LAGGING HARD? hmm..
from msft summary (Score:2, Interesting)
sounds very scary indeed.
just wondering what that huge, hairy gorilla do with those poor people
Re:Forgot one... (Score:3, Interesting)
Thanks, George.
Re:Who really cares? (Score:2, Interesting)
Maybe employee satisfaction does not count with them as they are no longer employees?
It makes sense that they could beat out 60% of the other companies, because he did say it was cool to be working on a game even if it was 70+ hours a week.
Corporation is collectivist system (Score:3, Interesting)
Protectionism is for the selfish. (Score:5, Interesting)
If Microsoft decided to outsource half their workforce to India, what would happen? A few thousand programmers would go on the job market-- highly qualified programmers, whatever you say about Microsoft. The average programmer's wage would probably go down some, and, after a while, the numbers of new coders coming out of college would decrease to compensate. The programmers that lost their jobs would hardly be starving in the streets-- IT workers are generally adaptable people-- they could go back to school, become teachers, or something else that's needed.
However, for the 3rd world worker, an IT job seems far more important than to a (relatively) wealthy American. For them, a job programming could mean the difference between food on the table, and the gutter.
There are other, more tangible, disadvantages to protectionism. If the US is taxing Indian Software, India will probably return fire. Trade wars like these could be devastating to all sides.
Re:5. adobe systems (Score:5, Interesting)
Well, I am a manager at Adobe Systems, and I won't accept resumes in anything except PDF. If you want to get in the door, show me that you can figure out how to use our tools to reach me. And for those that don't have a full copy of Acrobat, we have an online service (free for sample use) that allows you to create a PDF. And I have been know to give copies of Acrobat to high-quality candidates to see what they would do with it. Think of it as an aptitude test.
Re:I think a programmers union would be good... (Score:2, Interesting)
There are some striking firemen in the UK that might disagree with you.
...and some unemployed people who used to work in the coal industry.
...and some unemployed people who used to be in the ship building industry.
...and some unemployed people who used to work in the automobile industry.
...and some disabled ex-soldiers.
...etc.
L.
tech union = training (Score:2, Interesting)
Training is one arena where a tech union might really make a diffence. Why?
1). For the most part, US employers no longer invest in training. They expect workers to be responsible for their own skills upgrades and maintenance.
2). 100% responsibility (freelance or FT employee) for your own training can be expensive, time-consuming, and (sometimes) almost obsolete before you finish it.
3). By banding together, workers can build their own training programs that are high-quality, evolve rapidly to meet industry demand, and are cheaper (for members) than similar offerings at a community college or university.
Case in point: WashTech/CWA in Seattle WA has built its own IT union training program from scratch. It now offers ASP.NET, XML, Java, Flash, Perl and more. Members get significant course discounts. No other local union in the country is offering such training. Member dues help to subsidize discounted training for everyone. If you take one WashTech class in the course of a year, the savings compared to non-members course fees can equal or surpass one year's dues.
Details:
http://www.washtech.org/wt/training/
No pure software companies (Score:3, Interesting)
open promotion of a viewpoint... (Score:2, Interesting)
---I "save and invest" but not in the usual manner, not really. Zero stocks or bonds, etc, none.Not even close to being classed as wealthy in any sort of traditional dollar figure way.
I "invest" in things differently, I always strive to eliminate middleman steps and costs for my goods and services, like I bought solar power, so I have a guaranteed minimum electric supply paid off now for years and years. Long term food,open pollinated heirloom seeds,etc, etc what is considered "normal" in the survival and preparedness community but not what is considered normal in "mainstream" joe six pack everything "just in time" community. All of my wealth is (well more or less) in tangibles assets of some form or another. As to money for money's sake, nope, never been a real high interest of mine, and yes, I know that's considered weird but other's opinions of that are not really my concern. Different strokes and all.
Umm, economically your data might need to be rechecked. Just a few thoughts here. We went from the world's largest creditor nation to the world's largest debtor nation in roughly 25 years. If that isn't considered "going down the crapper" I don't know what is. It's not all the way flushed yet, and the swirling around is contributing to the razzle dazzle, but she's been flushed. Check-just for a few-the top ten US banks derivatives exposure, the fortune 500 pension funds exposure, and re-run the social security ponzi scam projected numbers. Check population demographics in the US again. Just look at those, now add in true governmental borrowing/debt as opposed to them calling a reduction in spending once in awhile as a "surplus". Now look at international balance of trade figures. Now look at successful new business starts as opposed to closings and bankruptces and off-shore moves. If you want even more go back and uncook wall street historical indices by re-including the companies they pull off the bottom of the lists when they tank. That little *gem* of a misdirection is used to keep the numbers artifically inflated, it's a great shill.
I don't consider "accumulated debt combined with offers of more credit" to equate "produced accumulated wealth", although, again, I realise most people think they are the same or similar.
Now I don't think it's hopeless, but I do think that there seems to be an agenda or two out there to make things "bad" for awhile and to do it on purpose. You may ponder what that purpose might be for. I have some theories on it. I will term it a "controlled socio/economic implosion with some good plausible deniability" leading to yet another term which is "technofeudalism". Hope I'm wrong, not seeing a lot of evidence to dissuade me, look as I might.
Economically I'm a neo-bear right now if I can coin a term, socially for the US with politics as it is and some other factors I am a hardcore pessimist. Hardcore and not trying to dodge it whatsoever. I don't want to be but I am. The term used is "dragged kicking and screaming" to that position. I make provisions accordingly, and any friendly advice I give people is based on that, same as anyone else comes to conclusions and might offer a view or some advice. I know during the bubble I kept telling friends who were heavily "into" the market to take the profits while they could and not try to ride it to ridiculous heights that were so far out into implausible-land as to be laughable. Some did, some didn't, oh well. What I DO do is change my viewpoint occassionally based on new input and better data and changing current events,and I consider nothing man does as "carved in stone".
Re:Microsoft is #20???? (Score:1, Interesting)
That being said, I work for MS and attended a top engineering school. Both required me to work my hardest, and both measured my performance against my peers. It's the kind of atmosphere I live for and strive for. I love the cool technology I get to work with, and I know if I try my hardest and create results then I'll always have a job with a ton of great perks.
In the end, MS has happy employees. They work hard, and are compensated for their efforts like any good company should. If your friend finds himself falling behind, then maybe this isn't the right industry for him- we're all destined to burn out in 8 years (and he seems far ahead of pace
Re:I think a programmers union would be good... (Score:3, Interesting)
Yes, actually it is true. The AMA artificially restricts the number of doctors in the market to insure wages are kept high. Doctors also have the power to keep clinics from hiring additional doctors because it means sharing another piece of the pie. Doctors would rather see 3 month waiting lists than having another doctor on staff.
It's not that doctors don't care about their patients, but keeping their pockets lined with green is pretty high up on the priority lists. Now obviously there are groups such as Doctors without Borders that are exceptions.
Re:Microsoft is #20???? (Score:1, Interesting)
For these, and a number of other reasons (the morality of the business plan is an important issue to me when accepting a job) I will never work for Microsoft again.
Nestle (Score:3, Interesting)
Feed this, muther fucker [bbc.co.uk]
CEO being nice? (Score:2, Interesting)
A quick financial look shows that the Xilinx CEO Roelandts has over 4 million options worth $122 million. 20% of his $580k salary is NOTHING to him. What is important is stock price. A round of layoffs could deflate his options by $60 million or more if the stock price fell as a result.
Re:% Minorities? % Women? (Score:3, Interesting)
Women make the workplace more interesting. Even if you aren't going to sleep around the office, a little inter-gender tension keeps people on their toes, and even encourages some of the geekiest to bathe. Plus, it often means birthdays and holidays actually get celebrated.
Ditto for minorities. Most people spend more time with co-workers than their children - anything that changes the self-segregation in America is a good thing, and multi-lingual workplaces seem a lot more interesting to me. I've had fun trying to decode C-code comments in French...
Plus, if there are a large number of women in a company, women will feel more comfortable and more productive. Ditto for minorities. There's a lot of emotional pressure on you if you are the one black woman on staff.
Re:Hewlett Packard? (Score:2, Interesting)
HP was an incredible company. To have it ruined by greed is almost as much of a crime as what AT&T did to Bell Labs. True national treasures tossed in the trash can.
Re:Protectionism is for the intelligent. (Score:2, Interesting)
No, the focus of the US government should be to protect the civil rights of US citizens. When government is applied to social "problems", the solution benefits only some at the expense of all others. In this scenario, you can expect waste, inefficiency, corruption, and oppression -- just like we have today in the US.
Re:#51 Harley Davidson (Score:1, Interesting)
Some of us like things with a few rough edges. How those rough edges are handeled is what gives them character.
Some of my code is like a Sportster [sportster.org]. Simplisity and quickness is optimised.
Some of my code is like a Road King. Built to work all day and all night under heavy load.
Some of my code is like an FXDX. It looks hot, and performs even hotter, for cruising about in public.