The Most Desired Workplaces for Recent Grads
March 27, 2011 by admin
Filed under Career News and Advice
NEW YORK (MainStreet) — Given the choice, younger professionals are most interested in working at tech companies and government agencies, but they are comparatively disinterested in working in the financial industry, a new survey shows.
Google (Stock Quote: GOOG) and Apple (Stock Quote: AAPL), two of the biggest tech companies in the world, ranked as the top two companies that recent college graduates would like to work at, according to a survey conducted by Universum, a research firm. Government agencies like the State Department and FBI also placed in the top 10.
Much of the incentive to work at Google and Apple is the cool factor surrounding these companies and their products, as the survey found young professionals were most influenced by the strength of the corporation’s brand when picking their most desired companies.
“Companies that have appealing consumer brands generally also succeed in being perceived as attractive employers. People nowadays love to work for companies that produce their favorite products and services,” said Kortney Kutsop, employer branding specialist for Universum. “Also, market success is an important factor: The company needs to be generally seen as innovative and best-in-class in whatever they do – that’s the winning formula.”
By contrast, financial institutions like Citigroup, Wells Fargo and Deutsche Bank,whose brands have been tarnished in recent years by the collapse of the financial industry, ranked in the lower half of the list of 99 companies desired by young professionals.
Beyond the power of a company’s brand, college grads were also heavily influenced by the perceived financial stability of each company, which may explain why major corporations like Google would rank at the top, since they are constantly expanding and hiring new employees. On the other hand, government agencies, which fared slightly worse than the tech companies, may have been hurt by perceived weaknesses in recent years, given that the public sector as a whole has been forced to freeze wages and lay off employees.
Universum, which surveyed more than 10,000 young professionals who graduated from college in the last eight years, also found that much of this demographic is looking to switch jobs in the near future. In fact, half of those surveyed claimed to have applied to other jobs in the past year and a quarter plan to switch jobs within six months, suggesting that the organizations at the top of this list may receive an influx of new resumes and applications in the coming months.
The top 10 most desirable companies for young professionals, according to the survey, are as follows:
1. Google
2. Apple
3. The Walt Disney Company
4. U.S. State Department
5. Amazon
6. FBI
7. Microsoft
8. Central Intelligence Agency
9. NASA
10. Teach for America