Tech Job Hunt Handbook: Career Management for Technical Professionals

Researching EmployersWhy the Hell Would You Want to Work There?

Some world views are spacious, and some are merely spaced.

—Neil Peart, writer and rock musician

Damn, I was wet behind the ears.¹

That summer of 1981, the produce manager and the main produce clerk would tell me just how much every single early morning I came to work. My only saving grace was the sweet rock that blared from the banged-up radio with a makeshift hanger antenna; the first song I heard the very first morning of work was Billy Squier’s “In the Dark.”

Of course I felt this way; I was young and inexperienced and prior to this I had a paper route. In fact, I wasn’t quite ...