One Day, One Job » information technology

Forrester Research

Willy Franzen — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 14:54:47 +0000

I’m sure that you’ve heard plenty of people bemoan the fact that it’s nearly impossible to get users to pay for online content. Most people wouldn’t pay a single dollar to read a wonderful article from The New York Times. Maybe this will change eventually, but for now the “freeconomy” is giving many content producers fits. Some people who aren’t having a problem are the folks at Cambridge, MA based Forrester Research. They’re “an independent research company that provides pragmatic and forward-thinking advice to global leaders in business and technology,” and they consistently get people to pay hundreds or even thousands of dollars for their content. Most of the reason for this is the fact that they’re often selling to corporate clients who are a lot less price sensitive than individual users, but it’s still impressive. Buying research done by Forrester is a lot cheaper than doing the research yourself, so it’s a smart investment. That’s why Forrester Research was able to generate nearly a quarter billion dollars in revenue in 2008.

Research Pays

You’re probably wondering what kind of research Forrester does and why it’s so lucrative. It’s really all over the place (as long as it relates to business and/or technology). For $499 you can buy a report on The All-Wireless Campus: A Westmont College Case Study or a Western European Online Retail Forecast, 2009 To 2014. And at the $1,749 price point you can read up on The State Of Consumers And Technology: Benchmark 2009, Canada. If you’re only willing to spend $250 you may want to attend a teleconference on How To Use Twitter For Customer Service or Global Banking Platform Deals 2009. If you want to get a taste for yourself, and you’re not ready to pull out the credit card, then you should probably take a look at Forrester’s free research.

If you find some of the reports fascinating and not boring, then you should probably consider a Career at Forrester Research. They’ve won a lot of awards, and they seem to be using social media as a big part of their recruiting. Their current openings (in Cambridge unless otherwise noted) include: Web Developer, Sales Development Specialist – Selling to Technology Vendor Professionals (London, UK), Research Associate (also in London and New York), Events Coordinator, Database Marketing Associate, Client Relations Specialist (San Francisco, CA), Citations Specialist, Briefings Specialist – Client Services, and Billing Specialist. There are a lot of options for new and recent grads, and they’re a great alternative to hanging around in academia. Forrester’s research locations include Dallas, TX; Foster City, CA; New York, NY; San Francisco, CA; Washington, DC; Amsterdam, NL; London, UK; Frankfurt, Germany; and Paris, France; while they have even more sales centers, so be on the look out for more positions in those locations. And if you want an inside look at what a Research Analyst does, here’s a great blog post on the topic.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Would you ever read a Forrester report for pleasure reading?

General Mills

Willy Franzen — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 14:51:47 +0000

Happy St. Patrick’s Day! In past years we’ve looked at Shamrock Boats and Luck Stone to celebrate the holiday, but today we’re going to take a look at jobs with Minneapolis, MN based General Mills because there’s no more authentic Irish breakfast than Lucky Charms. Now, it’s been a while since I last had a bowl of everybody’s favorite marshmallow-filled cereal—ok, it’s been a month—but it feels like it’s been much longer. Beyond Lucky Charms, General Mills’ brands include Cheerios, Pillsbury, Gushers, Haagen-Dazs, Betty Crocker, Cascadian Farm, and many more names that you’ll recognize from the center aisles in the grocery store. Most of them may have nothing to do with St. Patrick’s Day, but add some green food coloring if that’s what you’re really concerned about.

Work at the Mills

There’s not much more to say about General Mills. Their focus is on their 100+ brands, and that’s what makes them the world’s 6th largest food company. They hold the No. 1 or No. 2 position in nearly every category that they compete in, and their products are so ubiquitous that the average U.S. grocery shopper places at least one General Mills product in his or her cart every time he or she shops. Because General Mills is such a large company, they have a very strong Campus Recruiting Program. Unfortunately, their Campus Events Calendar indicates that most of their recruiting has passed. Typically they place new grads into the following areas:

Because the Campus Recruiting season has passed for General Mills, your best bet is to use their job search function to look for positions. There are certainly entry level positions available, so give it a look and hope for some St. Patrick’s day luck when you apply.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What’s your favorite General Mills brand?

Communispace

Willy Franzen — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:43:37 +0000

We’re already working on new projects based on your feedback. If you want your voice heard, please take 3 minutes (seriously, it’s short) to complete our One Day, One Job survey.

As the preceding note indicates, I’ve been collecting user data over the past week to help me make the site more useful for you. So far the survey has received hundreds of responses, and there are a number of common themes that keep coming up. It’s amazing at how well an 8 question survey can tell me about what you guys want in a job search tool. For companies that need a little more than an 8 question survey, there’s Communispace, a Watertown, MA based market research company. Their name probably wouldn’t have made them too popular during the cold war, but fear of communism has been replaced with community building—which is what Communispace is all about.

Join the Communispace Community

Communispace works with some of the world’s biggest brands (like Pepsi, Hallmark, and Unilever) to build private online communities. These communities allow Communispace clients to interact directly with their customers. They can ask for insights, identify trends, test nearly anything, and build customer loyalty. As a business owner, I know how valuable all of those things are. Luckily, I already have a community of awesome users who are constantly giving me feedback. It isn’t so easy for huge brands. They need help, and Communispace offers an end to end solution. They provide the technology, the expertise, and the community management. The world of market research is changing as it gets cheaper and easier to reach customers en masse, and it seems that Communispace is at the forefront of this change. If you’d like to join them, check out their Jobs page. The most suitable positions for new grads are Associate Community Manager and Sales Operations Associate. There are also some technical/software jobs, but they don’t seem to be geared towards new grads. Most importantly, Communispace allows you to apply for an unlisted position, so you can do some research on their Team page and on LinkedIn to get a better sense of what kind of positions they offer but may not have posted.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you taken our survey yet?

HBO

Willy Franzen — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 16:42:39 +0000

If you haven’t already, please take 3 minutes (seriously, it’s short) to complete our One Day, One Job survey. It’s going to help us improve the site to make it easier for you to find awesome entry level jobs.

It’s the ultimate premium channel. The one that separates the haves from the have nots—at least when it comes to cable packages. HBO or Home Box Office is the pinnacle of cable television. Ok, maybe I’m going a bit far, but I remember how excited I was when one day HBO was suddenly part of my family’s cable package. The cable company made a mistake, and I was now able to watch all kinds of great movies in the comfort of my own home (and without having my mom take me to Blockbuster). Of course, HBO, which is based in New York City, isn’t just about movies. Their original programming is one of the key reasons that they have more than 40 million subscribers in the US. HBO’s series past and present include Arliss, Sex and the City, Entourage, The Sopranos, Fraggle Rock, and plenty of others. Then there are their documentaries and sports coverage. It’s why people pay extra for HBO (and Cinemax, its sister station): high quality programming without commercials.

Do You Get HBO?

What many people don’t realize about HBO is the role that they’ve played in the history of cable and satellite television. TV used to be free. Then people started paying for cable with packages of channels. Then HBO came along and people started paying extra for individual channels. It almost sounds like the evolution towards paid content that we’re seeing on the Internet; however, I’m not sure that anyone is constantly innovating like HBO has done in the television industry. They were the first to transmit digitally. The first to encrypt their satellite signal. The first to broadcast in HD. The first to offer premium video on demand. HBO knows what their customers want before they want it, so they’re continually able to stay ahead of other premium channels. It will be exciting to see how HBO transforms as more and more content moves online.

Now, what if you want to be a part of the future of HBO? You’ll have to head over to their Jobs page, which is hosted by Time Warner, their parent company. Right now there are 44 openings, and a few of them look well suited to new and recent grads. Unfortunately the Time Warner applicant tracking systems is a total piece of crap, so I can’t link you directly to positions. You should look out for the following job titles: Broadcast Installation Technician, HBO Sports – Production Associate, Project Coordinator, Digital Media Coordinator, CRO Assistant, HBO/DGA Television Directing Fellowship Program, On-Air Planner, and Freelance Production Designer – Off-Air Creative Services. It’s hard to say which of these positions are truly entry level and which require a couple years of experience, but all of them should be worth looking at. You can apply online, by finding the specific job listings on HBO’s Jobs page.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Did you get HBO growing up?

Rosetta

Willy Franzen — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 16:31:08 +0000

I got a tip on this one from a fellow Cornellian (which is cool because a few of my friends from Cornell work at Rosetta). If you ever find a company that you think that we should feature, e-mail me at willy@onedayonejob.com. We feature a lot of interactive marketing agencies because they’re usually pretty big on hiring young talent whether it be at the intern or entry level. Rosetta stands out because of their size and sophistication—they almost seem more like a consulting firm than a marketing agency, at least in the way that they present themselves. For instance, they recently become a “top ten interactive agency” by means of an acquisition. That seems so different from the image that most agencies try to portray, but it’s working. Through “dedication to client work within Consumer Products & Retail, Healthcare, Financial Services, Consumer Technology & Media, B2B, and Travel & Hospitality industries” Rosetta “has created enduring partnerships with [their] clients including Scholastic, Coach, Borders, Johnson & Johnson, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Nationwide, Marriott and Microsoft.” Those are huge names, so you know Rosetta, which is headquartered in Princeton with offices in New York, Cleveland, Boston, Chicago, and Denver, is capable of delivering results.

Relationships Matter

One of Rosetta’s key offerings is their suite of Relationship Marketing Services, which are focused on helping clients segment customers and offer “intelligent, personalized interactions across all online and offline channels.” This is just one part of the story, though. To get the full story on Rosetta’s offerings, you should take a look at this diagram. It shows how Rosetta walks clients through the marketing process—from creating the top-level strategy to using analytics to measure results. This means it’s not surprising that Rosetta’s job offerings are as varied as their service offerings—their Careers page is titled “Graphic Design Careers, SEO Jobs, and Financial Services Consulting Opportunities at Rosetta.”

As I mentioned in the beginning of the post, Rosetta seems to have a strong connection with Cornell (and probably quite a few other colleges) based on campus recruiting. Interestingly enough, Rosetta doesn’t really have a campus recruiting page—just a profile of a new grad who went to work for them. From there you can find their job search function, which is pretty terrible. It does appear to let you search for specifically entry level positions; however, there are at least 3 different queries that you can use, and they all seem to deliver different results. Your best bet is to look at their full list of job openings, or to look for positions like Recent Graduate Business Associate, Recent Graduate Technology Associate, Associate Consultant, Account Executive, Technology Associate, User Interface/Rich Media Developer, Recent Graduate Business Analyst, and quite a few others. The way that Rosetta lists their jobs is really a mess, so you need to take note that different jobs with the same title may be in different practice areas. Additionally, single job postings may be for multiple locations. They do have some nice pages on their Careers site like Meet Our People and Fun at Rosetta, but the whole thing is disorganized. I expect a lot better from a top ten agency. You can apply online for any of these positions, so forgive Rosetta for the lack of usability on their Careers site and see if you can help them move further up the top ten.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Were you looking Rosetta Stone’s jobs?

Aircell

Willy Franzen — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 14:28:06 +0000

After a week of cold weather in Florida, I’m headed back to Chicago. Since I wanted to enjoy the last night of my vacation, I decided that I’d try to get this post to you from 31,000 feet. I’m flying on AirTran (maybe we’ll look at their jobs another time), and all of their flights offer Gogo Inflight Wi-Fi, which is a service provided by Itasca, IL based AirCell (I used this promotion to get a free access coupon code). The business of Internet Service Providers was a big one in the 90s, but as we’ve become more accustomed to broadband, we’ve mostly started using major telecom companies to feed our Internet addictions. Now, the business opportunities are all about providing Internet access in locations with captive audiences—hotels, convention centers, airports, and now airplanes, although 3G card providers are offering some fierce competition. Luckily for Aircell, that’s not an option in the air, which means that, for now, Gogo has a dominant market position with their because of their FCC sanctioned rights to be the “exclusive provider of Wi-Fi communications to airlines, business aviation, military, government, and specialty aircraft across North America.”

Gogo Get a Job

Who knows what the future of Gogo will be? It’s pretty obvious that Internet access will soon be expected on all but the smallest planes, but how will that play out? Will the FAA allow us to start using cellular devices so that we can use 3G or 4G cards? Will airlines continue to nickel and dime us (ok, we know the answer to that one)? Will we continue to pay for in-flight Internet access or will there be an ad supported option? There are a lot of questions to be answered, but it seems that Gogo is well positioned to take advantage of the current market opportunities. They received a significant venture capital investment, and their Jobs page seems to indicate that they’re continuing to grow. Additionally, Aircell isn’t a business solely based on Gogo; in fact, they’re much more. They are “the world’s leading provider of airborne communications.” That means that what they do goes well beyond allowing you to watch stupid YouTube videos on a cross-country flight. There aren’t many entry level opportunities at Aircell, but you’ll probably want to check out the Airline Account Manager and Product Analyst positions. To apply send your résumé and cover letter in plain text, MS Word or RTF to recruiting@aircell.com.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you ever used wi-fi on a plane?

NetJets

Willy Franzen — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 15:36:24 +0000

If I ever make a ridiculous amount of money, the first thing that I’m going to do is buy a private jet—or at least a share in one. It seems like the ultimate way to travel. I’ve been on private planes before, but they had propellers and I was sitting next to or right behind the pilot (not nearly as classy). NetJets is a company that allows wealthy individuals and businesses to buy shares in private jets (since who really needs an entire jet to himself or herself?). They also have a subscription service called MarquisJet that lets you get a guaranteed number of hours of private jet use. It may not make private air travel affordable or cost effective, but it certainly puts it within reach for a lot more people. NetJets is by far the market leader, and they’re also a Berkshire Hathaway company. You know if Warren Buffett is investing in it, it has to be pretty good. NetJets is based in Columbus, OH, but quite obviously they operate all over the world.

Be a NetJetter

Even Warren Buffett thinks that private jet travel is a ridiculous luxury, but that didn’t stop him from becoming a customer and then buying the company when the time was right. The truth is that commercial airline travel is a pain in the butt, and many people will pay exorbitant costs to avoid it. Even if energy costs get continue to grow, you have to like the future of NetJets. Assuming that you aren’t morally opposed to private air travel, you should check out NetJets’s Jobs page. It’s split in to three sections: Pilots, Flight Attendants, and Corporate Positions. We’ll look at the latter since that’s most likely to have good fits for new grads. There are 15 jobs posted right now, and a few appear to be suitable for new grads. These include IT Business Analyst, Prospect Development Specialist (Teetorboro, NJ), and Technical Marketing Analyst. You can apply online, but we can’t link you directly to the job descriptions because NetJets uses a crappy applicant tracking system.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you ever flown on a NetJet?

Acquia

Willy Franzen — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 15:56:35 +0000

I’m a huge fan of open source software. I build all of my sites on the WordPress platform, and I am amazed at how powerful the blogging software has become over the years. Still, I know that it can’t do everything. If I get too much more advanced, I’ll probably have to move to a platform like Drupal—another open source content management system. The problem with that is that I’m not a programmer, and Drupal is a bit more complex than WordPress. Luckily, there’s a support option. Acquia is a Woburn, MA based company that provides “products, services, and technical support for the open source Drupal social publishing system.” They were founded by Dries Buytaert, the guy who created Drupal, so there’s no question about whether they’re the right people to offer Drupal support—they know the platform inside and out.

Acquia a Job

It may seem strange that powerful software like Drupal is available for free to anyone. Why would software developers give away their hard work? Maybe some of it is altruistic, but it turns out that there are a lot of business models that can be built on top of free software—and they work better when the software has more users. Acquia is a perfect example. Support is worth big bucks to many Drupal users, so $8,000 annually for Acquia’s Enterprise package is money well spent. Acquia has been growing rapidly; with an infusion of capital last year, they have been able to grow their team pretty quickly. If their Jobs page is any indication, this trend hasn’t stopped. Right now Acquia has a number of positions open that seem suitable for new grads. These include Front-End UI Developer, Client Advisor, Technical Consultant, and Inside Sales Rep. You can apply online for any of these positions through this form.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Had you heard of Drupal before?

SpaceX

Willy Franzen — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 15:35:37 +0000

You may have heard that NASA just had what was probably the final night launch of the space shuttle. I was lucky enough to see one a few years ago from a beach in Connecticut, although it didn’t look like much more than a bright light screaming through the night sky. Our space program is going through a lot of changes, and it seems that current funding for some future programs isn’t what the people at NASA were hoping for. Many fans of the space program are disappointed and pessimistic about the future of space exploration. Luckily, the past decade has led to the rise of private space companies that are taking up a lot of the slack when it comes to space flight. One of these companies is Hawthorne, CA based SpaceX, which was started by PayPal co-founder Elon Musk in 2002. Their focus is on building launch vehicles (mostly for satellites) that are not only more reliable, but also more affordable.

JobX

SpaceX has been growing like crazy—in late 2005 they had 160 employees, and now they employ more than 800 people. Not only has SpaceX grown at an impressive rate up to this point, but they seem to be continuing their growth. Their Jobs page shows more than 70 open positions. As long as the government keeps cutting its funding for space program, the private aerospace industry is going to keep booming. SpaceX is well positioned as they already have a track record of success—they were the first private company to develop a launch vehicle and reach earth orbit from the ground.

If that sounds like something that you want to be part of, then you should check out jobs at SpaceX—they even have opportunities for people who don’t have a background in aerospace. They identify 7 of the jobs that they have posted as being for new graduates: Dynamics Engineer, Electrical Engineer, Guidance, Navigation, and Controls Engineer, Mechanical Engineer- Fluids & Thermal, Mechanical Engineer- Structures, Software Engineer, and Systems Engineer. There are plenty of other positions posted, so you may want to check them out even if they’re not explicitly identified as being for new grads—these include jobs in Marketing, HR, Technical Writing, and more. You can apply online for positions at SpaceX, and you should also take note of the following:

Since the people we seek tend to be highly sought after, SpaceX offers up to a $5000 referral award to anyone who refers a candidate we hire.

If you end up applying for a job at SpaceX, please let them know that you found about them from One Day, One Job.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What do you think about the private aerospace industry?

DriveCam

Willy Franzen — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 16:00:48 +0000

It’s every teen’s worst nightmare. You finally reach that magical age where the state says that you’re ready to drive a car. Your parents reluctantly hand over the keys to the family station wagon. You get a lecture, but you’re going to escape. You’ll finally have the freedom that you’ve been waiting for all your life. But there’s a catch. Your parents have installed a camera in the car to assess your driving and mitigate risk. It’s from a San Diego based company called DriveCam. To you it’s a terrible idea. You hate being spied on. You know you’re a good driver with your state mandated 20 hours of experience behind the wheel. What you probably don’t know is that car accidents are the leading cause of teen death. You’re too caught up in having a sense of freedom to care that this device has reduced the risk of reportable crash by 70% over the course of 2 million miles.

I Always Feel Like Somebody’s Watching Me

I’m sure that I would have resented my parents if they had put a DriveCam in my car, but I must be getting old because now I think it would be a pretty good idea. If you’re not convinced, all you need to do is look at some of the videos on DriveCam’s website to get it. The way it works is pretty cool—DriveCam is only triggered by “fairly aggressive or inattentive driving.” It is constantly recording so that it can catch the moments before a triggering event, but any data collected that is not immediately before a triggering event is deleted. By setting the goal of not triggering the camera, DriveCam forces drivers to slow down and pay more attention. It’s not just for teens, many companies use it to monitor fleet drivers as well. The way it works is that DriveCam uploads video via a cellular network to DriveCam’s servers, and then there’s a Software as a Service subscription that allows the parents or business owners to analyze the data uploaded by DriveCam. The software even provides coaching advice and risk scores. There was a lot of resistance to seat belts when they first came out, but now nearly everyone uses them. I see the potential for the same to be said about DriveCam in 10 or 20 years. That’s why they’re one of the Inc. 500 Fastest Growing Private Companies. They have a ton of potential for growth, and they’d be a great place to start a career. Their Careers page doesn’t list any positions beyond an internship right now, but they do invite interested applicants send a résumé and cover letter to jobs@drivecam.com. Take a look at their company profile to see what kind of positions they might have.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Did your parents install a DriveCam?

ING Direct

Willy Franzen — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 15:42:55 +0000

I’m a big proponent of making personal finance part of the job search. By managing your money wisely (even if you barely have any left), you’re creating a project for yourself that you can use to demonstrate to employers how you’ll be an effective employee. When I need information on personal finance, I always look to Ramit Sethi, the founder of a website called I Will Teach You To Be Rich and the author of a book by the same name (he also just launched a course on how to make money freelancing and he’s doing a free webinar tonight at 7 PM PST – affiliate links). One thing that he strongly recommends is using online banks that offer high interest rates and great easy to use features. One of these banks is ING Direct, which is headquartered in Wilmington, DE. While you may have noticed that most banks are on a real estate binge as they try to gain customers, ING Direct is doing the opposite. They operate almost entirely “in the cloud.” Since they “believe saving money should be as simple as having a cup of coffee,” they do have cafés in New York, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, Wilmington, Chicago, St. Cloud, and Honolulu where you can ” sip a latte, surf the Internet for free and talk to [them] about how [they] can help you Save Your Money.” And by keeping a low overhead, ING Direct is able to offer better interest rates and fewer fees, which gives them a huge advantage in winning over customers.

Saving Towards a Career

It may be hard to imagine not needing a brick and mortar bank, but ING Direct makes it work. They have a huge ATM network, they’ll write and mail your checks for you, and they make transferring money between accounts simple. It’s the way that you’ll expect to bank in the future, but ING Direct is doing it now. ING Direct is owned by ING, the Dutch financial institution, but it seems that they act quite independently—they’re not like other banks. This is where banking is headed, so ING Direct should be the place to be if you want to work in “retail” banking. To get started, you need to check out ING Direct’s Jobs page. You’ll see that in addition to their Wilmington, DE location, they also have offices in St. Cloud, MN; Los Angeles, CA; and Seattle, WA. There are dozens of positions posted, and quite a few of them appear suitable for new grads. Most of these positions fall into one of three categories: Sales, Analyst, or IT/Software Development; however, there are a few exceptions like Interactive Advertising Designer and Card Dispute Associate. Unfortunately, ING Direct’s applicant tracking system is kind of terrible, so it makes it impossible for me to link to specific positions. You’ll have to browse through the listings yourself, and apply through their submission form.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Do you have an ING Direct account?

Intellectual Ventures

Willy Franzen — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 15:30:53 +0000

One of the books that I’ve been reading lately is SuperFreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes, and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance. It’s a great follow-up to the original Freakonomics, and it once again shows how changing your mindset can lead you to all kinds of new ideas (this is a really important lesson for job seekers). One of the companies that is mentioned in the book is Intellectual Ventures, a Bellevue, WA based invention company. They’re all about ideas. Things like product design, product development, manufacturing, marketing, sales, and service all come later, and Intellectual Ventures doesn’t want anything thing to do with those processes. They just invent, invent, invent. The company isn’t tied to one specific area—they’re working on problems like stopping Malaria, preventing hurricanes, and counteracting negative effects from climate change should they ever happen.

An Intellectual Venture for Your Career

For Intellectual Ventures it’s all about owning the intellectual property. They want to come up with the ideas, make them work, and then let other companies do the rest. The business side will be about licensing the technology to the right people on a non-exclusive basis possibly including spin-off companies, but for now it’s all about building a technology portfolio. Intellectual Ventures has been actively inventing since 2003, and since then they’ve filed thousands of patents. These patent applications “span a broad range of areas including computer software and hardware, user interface design, semiconductors, biomedical devices, advanced medical procedures, digital imaging, nanotechnology, nuclear energy and advanced particle physics.” As you can probably tell from that list of topic area (and the company’s name), Intellectual Ventures is filled with extremely smart people. It was founded by two former C level Microsoft executives.

If you’ve always been fascinated by invention and you think that you have the intellect, then you should check out Intellectual Ventures’ Jobs page. They have 50 positions posted right now, and most require a high level of education and experience, but a few seem suitable for new grads. Whether or not a position is right for you will rely heavily on how relevant your background is, so it makes more sense to browse the listings yourself to see what fits. You should also note that Intellectual Ventures has satellite offices in Silicon Valley, Austin, Tokyo, Beijing, Singapore, Seoul, and Bangalore.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you read SuperFreakonomics yet?

Palantir

Willy Franzen — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 16:09:27 +0000

I have to admit that the “jobs” that I’m most concerned with today is Steve Jobs. I can’t wait to find out what Apple is announcing today, and I wish that I had some relevant jobs to bring you. I don’t, but I did come across a really cool list yesterday called 5 Butt Kicking Companies You (Probably) Never Heard Of. The list is exactly what it promises, as it features 5 later stage startups that are growing rapidly and hiring lots of people. The first company on that list is Palantir, a Palo Alto, CA based company (with another office in McLean, VA) that “is working to radically change how groups analyze information.” They were founded by former PayPal employees and Stanford computer scientists. Right now the company is focused on two verticals: Government and Finance. Both areas deal with massive amount of data and information, so it makes sense that Palantir is starting with them.

Analyze This

The cool thing about Palantir is that they still have a startup attitude and culture despite the fact that they’re focused on two industries that most people don’t associate with fun. The types of problem that Palantir is trying to solve include “national security, global finance, cyber defense, regulation & oversight, public health, and disease control.” This isn’t just some Web 2.0 startup—it’s a serious business with clients who expect perfection. That’s why culture is so important at Palantir. They only hire the best: “Less than 3% of candidates who receive a phone interview will receive an offer.” It’s a strict meritocracy, with a family feel. They have the XBOX, masseuse, and on-site gym that you come to expect from startups, but there’s also the expectation that “‘work’ and ‘life’ are not separate universes.”

Palantir appears to do a lot of on-campus recruiting with a focus on engineers from elite schools. They don’t provide any information on college recruiting on their site, but you can take a look at current job openings. The most likely fits for new grads include Business Development Associate, Audio Visual Engineer, Software Engineer, Salesforce Applications Developer, Software Developer in Test, Web Developer, Quality Assurance Engineer, BD Operations IT Analyst, BD Operations Analyst, Facilities Operations Analyst, and Operations Administrative Analyst. There are plenty of entry level opportunities at Palantir, so apply online and see if you can be one of the few that make the cut.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Palantir?

U.S. Green Building Council

Willy Franzen — Sun, 24 Jan 2010 16:07:08 +0000

I live across the street from what was formerly the world’s largest building—the Merchandise Mart in Chicago. It’s massive at 4,000,000 square feet, which is extremely impressive considering it was opened in 1930. What’s even more impressive is that, with some debate, the Merchandise Mart is now the world’s largest “green” building. It is LEED-EB Silver certified, and apparently the retrofitting that they did to achieve this certification has cut utility bills by 10%. Upgrading one of the largest buildings in the world to be more energy efficient and environment-friendly is a daunting task, luckily the LEED Certification process provided the owners of the Merchandise Mart with guidelines to work to. The organization behind LEED is the U.S. Green Building Council, which is based in Washington, DC. They are a non-profit that is “committed to a prosperous and sustainable future for our nation through cost-efficient and energy-saving green buildings.”

LEEDing You to a New Career

We’ve heard a lot about green jobs over the past few years, yet we haven’t seen the growth to back up the talk. Although the U.S. Green Building Council is a non-profit that probably won’t grow as quickly as a for-profit focused on the $60 billion green building industry, they do have some pretty cool job offerings. Here are some stats that explain why the USBGC is doing what they do:

Buildings in the United States are responsible for 39% of CO2 emissions, 40% of energy consumption, 13% water consumption and 15% of GDP per year, making green building a source of significant economic and environmental opportunity. Greater building efficiency can meet 85% of future U.S. demand for energy, and a national commitment to green building has the potential to generate 2.5 million American jobs.

If you like where the USGBC is going, then you should check out their Jobs page. They have quite a few positions posted, and a number of them appear suitable for new grads. These include Associate – Chapter Leadership Development, Computer Systems Analyst, Education Review Associate, Executive Administrative Assistant, and LEED Technical Customer Service Associate. To apply for any of these positions you can send your “résumé and letter of interest with salary requirements and title of position applying for to jobs@usgbc.org.”

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What do you know about the U.S. Green Building Council?

Engadget

Willy Franzen — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 15:49:21 +0000

I don’t know if I’ll be able to sleep for the next five nights. I’m too excited for Apple’s January 27th event to announce their “latest creation.” Everybody is assuming that Apple (see Apple’s entry level jobs) is going to announce some sort of tablet computing device, but it’s hard to say whether anyone in the media actually has legitimate inside information on what this event is going to be about. Still, I love speculation, which is why I’ve been glued to Engadget for the past few weeks in hope of learning every little nugget information related to this tablet that I can. If you don’t already know, Engadget is “an online magazine (blog) focused on tech / gadget news and happenings in the world of consumer electronics.” They get millions of visitors to their site every month, and they’re actually owned by Aol. Their biggest competitor is probably Gizmodo (which is run by Gawker Media and was founded by Peter Rojas, the same guy who later founded Engadget), and the two sites appear to have very similar sized audiences. There’s also gdgt competing in the space, but they’re much smaller.

Calling All Gadget Geeks

If you love gadgets and are a great writer, there couldn’t be a better place for you to work than Engadget. The site covers everything from mobile phones to televisions and from cameras to mystery devices that are likely to be tablets. They even cover high-tech weapons. If it’s hardware (or really cool software), and it’s cool, Engadget will be all over it. Although I don’t subscribe vias RSS (they update way too often), I do visit the site often, and I recommend that you do to. It really is a great blog. Just yesterday Engadget published a blog post that said that they are hiring. They’re looking for:

Mobile editor – Part or full-time (freelance), must be based in New York City (or nearby).
HD editor – Part or full-time (freelance), must be based in New York City (or nearby).
Weekend editor – Part or full-time (freelance), must be based in New York City or the San Francisco area.
Cameras editor – Part or full-time (freelance), preferably based in New York City (or nearby).
West coast editor – Part time (freelance), based in San Francisco (or nearby).

They have a very specific application process, which makes sense since they are going to get bombarded with applications for these positions. Make sure that you follow the details closely, otherwise they’ll probably just ignore your application. These are some amazing opportunities, so act fast.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What do you think Apple will be releasing?

Cloudkick

Willy Franzen — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 15:54:34 +0000

My role at One Day, One Job goes well beyond writing the daily posts. For instance, when the server goes down, it’s my job to get it fixed. I spend a decent amount of time on IT type stuff, but I’m in no way an expert. I guess that means that it’s okay that I don’t completely understand what Cloudkick does. They’re a Y-Combinator startup based in San Francisco, and they’re “revolutionizing the way companies manage their IT infrastructure.” In more complex terms they provide tools that enable cloud server management through the APIs of a number of different web hosts. The truth is that most of you (like me) won’t understand what that means, but for those who do, Cloudkick should be worth looking at. What I can tell about Cloudkick is that they’re offering tools that make managing IT much simpler (even if it’s still really complex). The tools offered by many web hosts have terrible interfaces, so there’s a huge need for what Cloudkick is doing.

Give Your Career a Cloudkick-start

At this point Cloudkick is a very small start-up, and they’re still intensely focused on the technology side of their business. They services that they’re offering are currently free, and they haven’t started hiring for the types of business positions that come later in a startup’s lifecycle. They’ve already received a lot of press, and they apparently have lots of users. As they build out the paid premium services that they intend to offer, I’m sure that they’ll become a bit more interesting for non-techies. Right now, the only job posted on Cloudkick’s Careers page is for a Front-End Web Developer. It sounds like a pretty cool gig, so if you’re interested, “send an email to careers@cloudkick.com with a short introduction about yourself and your résumé.”

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Cloudkick?

Cobalt

Willy Franzen — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 16:09:06 +0000

Check out this week’s sponsor, New York City Teaching Fellows. They’re seeking new grads with no prior teaching experience or background in education to help make a difference in NYC’s public schools.

When I last bought a car in 2001, the best way to go about it was to stop by dealerships to see what they had in their inventory. I remember using the Internet to some extent, but it wasn’t all that helpful. Although I haven’t purchased a car since, I’m pretty sure that the web is playing a much larger role in the car buying decision process these days. That’s why Cobalt, a Seattle based company, is doing so well. They’re in the business of automotive marketing, and they made the Inc. 5000 last year with 134.0% three-year revenue growth to $168.4 million. Cobalt works with both dealers and manufacturers to “increase their retailing effectiveness and profits.” The company has been around since 1995, and it consists of three key subsidiaries: Dealix, UsedCars.com, and IntegraLink.

Drive Your Career in the Right Direction

The big reason that Cobalt has been so successful is that they were ready for the transition to digital marketing from the start. A lot of people in the automotive industry weren’t ready for a change in their business model, but luckily they have Cobalt to rely on for marketing. More than two thirds of auto manufacturers and one half of dealers in the US use Cobalt’s services in some capacity. Cobalt is a lot like a fully-integrated marketing agency in terms of the areas in which they work, but their business doesn’t appear to be quite as client focused (for instance they run a UsedCars.com—a destination site). If you’re intrigued by what Cobalt does, then you’ll want to take a look at their Careers page. It goes into a lot of detail about what it’s like to work at Cobalt, and then it will direct you to take a look at their job postings. There are lots of opportunities for new or recent grads including: Data Normalization Clerk (Columbus, OH), Technical Customer Support (Columbus, OH), Website Technical Support (Lynnwood, WA), Online Marketing Specialist (Lynnwood, WA), Technical Inside Sales (Redwood City, CA), Operations Analyst – Inventory (Seattle, WA), UI Web Developer (Seattle, WA), Build and Release Engineer (Seattle, WA), and Sales Operations Specialist (Seattle, WA).

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

When is the last time that you bought a car?

Doctors Without Borders

Willy Franzen — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 13:41:30 +0000

I was traveling yesterday, so I scheduled yesterday’s post and hopped on a plane. Little did I know that my server would somehow forget to do what I told it. Sorry! If you’re looking for yesterday’s post, you can find it here. (Or if you’re reading by e-mail, just scroll down.)

There are a lot of people who aren’t very thrilled with healthcare in the United States. Yes, it can be atrociously expensive, but at least we have access to pretty much any medical procedure out there. Whether it’s something very basic or something that has never been tried before, the US certainly has the medical infrastructure to get the job done. There are plenty of countries in the world where even the most basic medical care is out of reach, and there are other countries where basic medical care becomes out of reach due to a crisis. That’s where New York City based Doctors Without Borders (Médecins Sans Frontières) comes in. They provide “aid in nearly 60 countries to people whose survival is threatened by violence, neglect, or catastrophe, primarily due to armed conflict, epidemics, malnutrition, exclusion from health care, or natural disasters.” Doctors Without Borders does this by recruiting both medical and non-medical personnel to travel abroad to offer a level of medical assistance that is well beyond what is typically available.

MD Not Necessary

You don’t have to go to med school to make a difference through Doctors Without Borders. There are plenty of opportunities for lay people to get involved and make a difference. Here’s a sample of the work that Doctors Without Borders does:

In 2006, MSF medical teams gave more than 9 million outpatient consultations; hospitalized almost half a million patients; delivered 99,000 babies; treated 1.8 million people for malaria; treated 150,000 malnourished children; provided 100,000 people living with HIV/AIDS with antiretroviral therapy; vaccinated 1.8 million people against meningitis; and conducted 64,000 surgeries.

If that sounds like the kind of work that you’d like to be involved with, then you should head over to Doctors Without Borders’ Work page. You can learn more about working in the field, or you can take a look at their Office opportunities. Right now they’re looking for an IT/Network/Help Desk Assistant and a Communications Assistant. Both positions look suitable for new grads, so send a cover letter and résumé to employment.msfusa@newyork.msf.org if you’re interested.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Doctors Without Borders?

Uline

Willy Franzen — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 15:49:51 +0000

I love boring businesses. It may not seem like it considering the fact that I’m often featuring startups that are on the cutting edge of technology, but I really do appreciate when a company is able to take an extremely simple idea and make it profitable. Uline is a perfect example. They are a Waukegan, IL based company that considers itself “the leading distributor of shipping, industrial, and packing materials to businesses throughout North America.” It all started in 1980 when Liz and Dick Uihlein identified a need for a local shipping supplies distributer. They started the business in their basement with the H-101 carton sizer, and now they have a product line that fills a 452 page catalog. That’s a lot of growth, and I expect it to continue as e-commerce and the shipping that results from it keep expanding (I have about a dozen boxes in my apartment from various holiday season shipments). And if for some reason the shipping business does slow down, Uline can always reorganize as a producer of forts for children—I always loved playing in cardboard boxes.

Box It Up

Now, if you give Uline a closer look, there are some striking similarities between their business and our favorite fictional employer, Dunder Mifflin. They’re both customer service oriented companies that provide businesses with essential supplies; however, I’m going to make a wild guess that the similarities between Uline and Dunder Mifflin end there. Companies with dysfunctional leadership don’t have sustained growth, and Uline is growing so much that they broke ground on a new Pleasant Prairie, WI corporate headquarters last Fall. With that growth comes jobs, or American jobs as Uline likes to call them. If you take a look at Uline’s Jobs page, you’ll see that they have opportunities in Ontario, CA (that’s California, not Canada—I know it’s confusing); Toronto, Canada; Duluth, GA; Waukegan, IL; Tijuana, Mexico; Eagan, MN; Allentown, PA; Coppell, TX; and Seattle, WA. Positions that might be suitable for new or recent grads include Account Rep (Ontario, CA), Administrative Assistant (Toronto, CA), Customer Service Representative (Toronto, CA), Account Rep (Toronto, CA), Accounts Receivable Clerk (Toronto, CA), Account Rep (South Florida / Duluth, GA), Computer Operator / Help Line Technician (Waukegan, IL), .NET Web Developer (Waukegan, IL), Internet Marketing Associate (Waukegan, IL), Desktop Technician (Gurnee, IL), Account Rep (Eagan, MN), Account Rep (Iowa / Eagan, MN), Account Rep (NYC / Breinigsville, PA), Account Rep (Pittsburgh, PA / Breinigsville, PA), and Account Rep (Dallas – Ft. Worth, TX / Coppell, TX). You can apply online for any of these positions, just don’t try delivering yourself in a box to their corporate headquarters. That would be weird.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What have you heard about Uline?

Visa

Willy Franzen — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 15:40:07 +0000

It’s Black Friday! And that means that it times to talk about spending money. In previous years we’ve taken a look at jobs at Amazon.com and Ernst & Young (for companies that are “in the black”). We also look at jobs with SlickDeals, one of the best websites for finding Black Friday deals, a few months ago. Today we’re gong to look at Visa, since it’s hard to do any amount of serious shopping without some sort of debit or credit card. Many people think of Visa, which is headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area, as a credit card company, but that’s not exactly right. Credit cards are backed by a bank or similar financial institution that actually lends you the money to make your purchases. Visa is “a global payments technology company.” That means that they provide the network for your transactions, but they aren’t actually the lending institution backing your credit card.

Swipe Your Way to A New Job

One thing that a lot of people don’t realize is that payment processors like Visa get a cut of every transaction they enable. It typically comes out to a small percentage of the purchase price—so whether you pay for your lunch or buy a huge tv, the merchant isn’t getting the full amount of the charge. Merchants would make more money per purchase if they only accepted cash, but they’d likely lose a lot of customers that way. Obviously, it’s in Visa’s interest to get as many purchases going across their network as they possibly can. That’s why they’re constantly trying to develop new technologies, products, and services to make it easier to make a purchase using your Visa.

If you’re intrigued by payment processing or just think that Visa is a great brand that you’d like to work for, you should check out both their Careers page and their Campus Recruiting page. There’s a lot of information about jobs at Visa, along with a sections specifically on opportunities for undergraduates. Typically they offer positions in Systems (IT), Operations, and Finance along with a New Graduate Development Program that provides a rotation through the areas of Product, Marketing, Sales, and Strategy. The campus recruiting season for Visa has pretty much passed for undergraduates at this point in the year, but you can use their job search function to find specific opportunities to apply for.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Do you have a Visa?

Berry Plastics

Willy Franzen — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 15:39:49 +0000

A couple of days ago the blogosphere exploded (pun intended) with news about bomb proof wallpaper. The story originally came from Popular Science with a video of a wrecking ball trying to knock down a brick wall that has been reinforced with the X-Flex Blast Protection System (the video is included below). I always love news stories like this one, because it puts the spotlight on a company that you never would have otherwise. In this case it’s Berry Plastics, an Evansville, IN based plastics company. Their products range from agricultural films to plastic bottles and from drink cups to trash bags. There’s a good chance that you have dozens of items in your house/dorm/apartment that were manufactured by Berry Plastics—you just don’t know it because most people don’t care who manufactured their shampoo bottles.

Bomb Proof Your Job Search

I’m pretty sure consumers will be much more brand conscious when it comes to buying bomb proof wallpaper. Obviously the military is talking about using the X-Flex Blast Protection System, and I can also imagine the product’s being used in areas where hurricanes or tornadoes are prevalent. You’ll see why in the video below (subscribers should click through to view):

For me the obvious question whenever I find an interesting company like Berry Plastics is are they hiring? Considering that Berry Plastics has more than 13,000 employees (most of them in a manufacturing setting), I’d have to imagine that they’re always hiring at some level. Unfortunately Berry Plastics has the worst Applicant Tracking System that I’ve ever seen. It uses a Java applet, and it’s absolutely unusable. It doesn’t really make sense, since they have a pretty informative Careers page. Since I can’t get the read on specific positions, we’ll have to go by the fact that Berry Plastics says that they typically offer positions in the following areas: Accounting, Administration, Automation, Customer Service, Engineering, Graphic Arts, Human Resources, Information Technology, Production (Molding, Printing, Machine Operator, Material Handling), Maintenance, Management, Marketing, Materials Management, Purchasing, Quality Assurance, Sales, and Tool Room.

There’s no word on college recruiting, but you’d have to imagine that an Engineering focused company of 13,000 does at least some entry level hiring. You should also note that one of the benefits listed on their Careers page is “Fun.” I guess your best bet is to apply through their online application form, or if you’re really going to go for you could print your résumé on Berry Plastics’ bomb proof wallpaper and send it to them. They’d have to hire you because they wouldn’t be able to destroy your résumé.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Are you going to use bomb proof wallpaper?

Mars

Willy Franzen — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 15:02:10 +0000

Tomorrow is Halloween, which means that we need to talk about candy today. We’ve already looked at companies like Jelly Belly, The Hershey Company, Charles Chocolates, Vosges, and Just Born Quality Confections. We’ve also discussed jobs at Mars & Co., which is a consulting firm, and not to be confused with Mars, the CPG and candy company. You probably know them best for M&M’s, Snickers, Dove, Milky Way, Twix, and Mars bar; however, they’re also behind Pedigree, Whiskas, Uncle Ben’s, and quite a few other brands. For your sake I hope you only run into the good stuff and not Whiskas or Pedigree during your trick-or-treating. While headquartered in McLean, VA, Mars has locations all across the world. They’re a huge company with a ton of international business, which makes for a great place to gain some experience.

Take a Trip to Mars

It all started in 1911 with butter cream candies in a kitchen in Tacoma, WA. Frank C. Mars and his wife started selling these candies, and now you’d be hard pressed to find a person who has never tasted one of his company’s confections. If you’d like to be part of this true American success story, then you need to check out Mars’ Careers page. They offer a lot of information about their company and what it’s like to work for them, and they even have a separate section for students. It seems that most of the information that they provide is on International careers, but they have a job search function that will let you find what you’re looking for. And since you’re in the trick-or-treating mood, I’m going to leave that up to you—but just so you know, they have job opportunities in areas including Engineering, Finance, Human Resources, Information Technology, Logisitcs, Manufacturing, Marketing, Purchasing, Research & Development, & Sales.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

What’s your favorite candy from Mars?

Slide

Willy Franzen — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 14:39:03 +0000

It looks like Yahoo! Finance has taken a page out of my book and used Fortune’s 40 Under 40 list to highlight some companies that are hiring. I found the link on Twitter, and was pleased to see that I had already featured a number of the companies. One that I haven’t yet featured (and don’t remember hearing about before) is Slide. They’re a San Francisco based startup that claims to be “the world’s leading social entertainment company.” I think that’s a bit of a stretch, but they do make social networks more fun for hundreds of millions of people. Their 40 Under 40 CEO is Max Levchin, who co-founded PayPal (which was sold for $1.5 billion to eBay). He is apparently well on his way to having built another billion dollar company, considering the fact that Slide was valued at $550 million last time that they took money.

Slide into a New Job

The basic premise behind slide is that social networks are better when you can bring outside content in—whether it’s sharing something that you’ve made like a slideshow or using an application that allows you to throw sheep. People want customization, yet they don’t have the web development skills to do it on their own. They need help, and that’s where Slide comes in. Monetizing social network traffic isn’t necessarily easy, but Slide seems to be heading in the right direction when it comes to turning their massive traffic into revenue. Not only do their investors believe in them, but so do advertisers like Starbucks, Sunkist, Activision, AT&T Wireless, Discovery Channel, Estee Lauder, McDonald’s, Lionsgate Films, Universal Pictures, and Paramount Pictures. I guess 5 million sheep thrown a day is worth more than I thought it was. Slide is very clearly growing, and as I mentioned in the opening of this post, they’re hiring. Their Jobs page shows more than a dozen open positions, and a bunch of those are suitable for new grads. These include Product Manager, Community Manager, Flash Animator/Illustrator, Flash Social Game Engineer, Graphic Designer, Junior QA Engineer, Linux Server Engineer, OO Javascript/Front-end Engineer, Python Web Developer, and Community Support Representative. You can apply online directly from these links, so give Slide a look.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Do you use Slide?

20×200

Willy Franzen — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 14:00:56 +0000

Since we’re going to talk about art today, I have to give my little sister a shout out for her Vernissage benefitting Artists for Charity tomorrow. If you’re in the Fairfield, CT area and enjoy art, you need to check it out. Now, I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not all that into art. With a painter for a sister, a graphic designer for a mom, and an architect for a dad, I’m the black sheep of my family. Designing this site is about as far as my artistic talent goes. With that said, when you combine art with a cool web based business idea, my ears perk up. That’s exactly what happened when I saw a friend post an article about 20×200 (a part of Jen Bekman Projects) on Facebook. 20×200 is an online art and photography gallery based out of New York City, and they just closed a first round of $800,00 in venture capital funding. Now, you don’t typically see art galleries getting VC funding, but you also don’t typically see art galleries using the power of the Internet to make affordable art available to the masses either.

20×200 ≫ 4,000

The idea behind 20×200 is based on a pretty simple formula: (limited editions x low prices) + the internet = art for everyone. It all started with limited edition runs of 200 pieces sold at $20, and now 20×200 offers more sizes at more prices. Still, the goal remains to keep art affordable so that it becomes more accessible. It’s a brilliant idea because it takes advantage of exactly what the Internet is best at doing—making inefficient markets more efficient. Matching artists with buyers is tough work, and brick and mortar galleries just aren’t big enough to do the job well. 20×200 matches these people up easily. That’s why investors saw potential in them, and now 20×200 has some cash to spend. Judging by their Jobs page, it looks like hiring is one way that they plan on spending that money. Despite their artsy fartsiness, 20×200 is most focused on hiring techies right now—they’re looking for a System Admin and a Web Developer. I’m sure that there will be more jobs in the near future, and some of them will be a bit closer to the art side of things. For now, check out these jobs and consider reaching out to 20×200 to see if they’ll consider hiring you for an unlisted position.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Would you buy anything on 20×200?

SurveyMonkey

Willy Franzen — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 14:06:05 +0000

One of my goals with One Day, One Job is to get more interactive. I’d like to get more feedback from you, the readers, on what you want to see, and I’d also like to use the collective wisdom of thousands of college aged job seekers to develop better content. The best way to do that is through reader surveys, which is why I recently signed up with SurveyMonkey. They’re a Menlo Park, CA (formerly Portland, OR) based “startup” that has been helping people run online surveys for the last decade. While most Internet companies that started in 1999 have since flamed out and most companies started in the 2000s have relied on flashiness to bring in venture capital money, Survey Monkey and its outdated look have been laughing all the way to the bank. By providing a dead simple way for business owners (they’ve worked with more than 80% of the Fortune 100) to collect data, SuveyMonkey has built an insanely successful business.

SurveyMonkey Says…

As TechCrunch reported last month, SurveyMonkey has finally taken on some outside money and started to take growth seriously. They’ve more than doubled their staff over the last year, and they’ve revamped their management team. You won’t find a lot of information about SurveyMonkey online, but you will find a lot of people who have used their software. SurveyMonkey has never seemed to care much for flash or attention. Instead they have used the “Freemium Model” to bring in thousands of paying customers. If you’ve always wanted to work at a web startup, but were wary of the “scene,” then SurveyMonkey might be the right place for you. They have a number of job openings posted, and a few seem suitable for new grads. The most likely is Front-end Engineer, but they also have some positions in Marketing, Product Management, Technical Operations, and User Experience Design that might be work looking at. And if you don’t see anything that suits you, you can always use their online form to apply for an unlisted position.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you ever responded to a SurveyMonkey survey?

Facet Technology

Willy Franzen — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 14:57:50 +0000

In my day… Columbus Day was a real holiday. Now there’s a huge portion of the population that doesn’t even get the day off. Yes, I understand that Christopher Columbus was a bit overrated as a historical hero (and a lot of the things that we learned about him in grade school were inaccurate), but I’m still amazed that he had the guts and the persistence to make a voyage across the Atlantic happen. Now we’ll barely take a walk down the street without a GPS enabled device in our pocket. Navigation and exploration have a long history, but I’m not sure how much more advancement is possible. Facet Technology would disagree. They’re an Eden Prairie, MN based software and services company that is changing what state of the art means when it comes to the Transportation, Mapping and Food Processing Industries. They’re another Inc. 5000 company with 110.4% three-year growth, and I think they’re going to shoot up the rankings over the next few years.

Explore Every Facet

Computers are pretty good at identifying objects when they know what to expect. For instance, a factory that makes widgets can quite easily set up computers that use vision technology to ensure that the widgets are consistently produced. Every widget should be the same, so detecting differences isn’t all that difficult for computers. This all changes when you leave a controlled environment. This is how Facet Technology responds:

Many environments, however, don’t allow full control over all the parameters that make standard computer vision tools easy to use. By changing one of the parameters – either moving the man-made object into an uncontrolled environment (outdoors) or by changing the man-made object into a natural object (grain, fruit, meat, poultry, etc.) – the identification and inspection task becomes several times more difficult. This is where Facet’s patented technology shines and allows computer vision tools to now be used successfully. Facet allows you to control the uncontrollable.

Think about how this technology can change the way we navigate—the possibilities are endless. It really is the next step after GPS and location aware devices. If you’re intrigued by what Facet Technology is up to, then you should check out their job postings. Right now they’re looking for an Associate Software Engineer, a Computer System Specialist/Software Tester, and a Data Acquisition Vehicle Operator. While the latter doesn’t require a college education, it sounds like a pretty cool gig (driving around a camera equipped, ultra high-tech SUV to collect data). You can apply to any of the jobs by sending a cover letter and résumé to jobs@facet-tech.com.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

How important do you think Facet Technology will be in the future of navigation?

Tandberg

Willy Franzen — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 14:57:54 +0000

I think that I’ve mentioned before that my first experience with video chat was was with CU-SeeMe in an Internet cafe in the mid 90s. Back then the potential for social interaction over online video seemed pretty promising, but the potential for business uses (not that I thought about that when I was 13) was even greater. Real-time video has been slower to take hold on both the social and business fronts than I expected, but now that the quality is so good, we’re seeing more and more businesses embrace video conferencing. Tandberg is a company that is at the forefront of this movement. They have dual headquarters in Oslo, Norway and New York City, and they are both “the market share leader and the fastest growing company in the video conferencing industry.” Their 30% annualized revenue growth for the past 10 years may not be Inc. 5000 material, but it’s still hugely impressive.

I Wonder If They Use Video Interviews

While video conferencing can be as simple as opening up iChat and using the built-in iSight in your Mac, Tandberg offers a higher end experience. They offer products and services that offer superior a superior user experience with a focus on business uses. I remember using video conferencing in a class in college, and I was amazed at how effective it was for presenting to the company that we were working with on our project. It’s all about changing the way people communicate, and if that’s something that gets you excited, then you should check out Jobs at Tandberg. They have opportunities in the United States, Asia Pacific, and Europe. We’re going to focus on the US where they have entry level opportunities like Service Sales Account Manager – Western US, Service Sales Account Manager – Eastern US, Training Operations Supervisor (Reston, VA), Regional Support Specialist Chicago, IL or Reston, VA/Atlanta, GA, and Global Marketing Writer (Reston, VA). You can apply for any of the positions by sending a cover letter and résumé to hr@tandberg.com.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Do you ever use video conferencing?

Online Computer Library Center

Willy Franzen — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 15:54:49 +0000

Libraries used to be their own little kingdoms of knowledge. If you needed to research something, you’d go to the library and hope that they had what you were looking for. If they didn’t, you were out of luck. The Internet has changed everything. Now we live in a world where our libraries are interconnected and information resources can be shared instantly between institutions. And even there is a resource that can’t be shared electronically, you can track it down instantly. A big reason that this is possible is Dublin, OH based Online Computer Library Center. They started in 1967 as “a regional computer system for 54 Ohio colleges;” however, they have since grown to serving “more than 71,000 libraries of all types in the U.S. and 112 countries and territories around the world.” They’re better known as the OCLC, and they’ve very much an Information Technology focused non-profit.

You Down with OCLC?

OCLC’s vision is very simple: “The world’s libraries. Connected.” They do this through WorldCat (a global network of library content and services), a Membership Association, a wide array of Products and Services, Support and Training, and Programs and Research. Basically anything that helps libraries do their job better by networking with other libraries is OCLC’s realm. If you’re into Information Science, then this is the place to be. That’s also true because OCLC has been named by Computerworld as one of the 100 Best Places to Work in IT for the past 4 years, which is why you should check out their Careers page and job postings. You’ll want to check out jobs like Training and Support Coordinator (Washington, DC) and Software Engineer (Dublin, OH) among others. You can apply online, so get to it!

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

How thankful are you for OCLC?

College Hunks Hauling Junk

Willy Franzen — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 14:52:17 +0000

Today is the last day to enter our Maghound Your Way to a New Job contest. With so few entries so far, there’s an excellent chance that you’ll win a one-year subscription to an awesome new magazine subscription service (3 monthly magazines for free!).

I’m still on my Inc. 5000 kick, and today we’re looking at a company whose name immediately caught my eye. They’re called College Hunks Hauling Junk, and that’s exactly what they are. Omar Soliman wanted to make some money during the summer, so he borrowed his mom’s cargo van to start hauling away people’s junk. He then entered his business plan in the Rothschild Entrepreneurship Competition and won the $10,000 first prize. He realized that he had a business that he could grow, and now College Hunks Hauling Junk is doing $2.9 million in revenue. Guess that’s why Omar and his co-founder Nick were named (also by Inc.) as Top 30 Entrepreneurs Under 30. College Hunks Hauling Junk is headquartered in Tampa, FL, but through expansion and franchising they now operate in Anne Arundel, MD; Baltimore/Howard County, MD; Chicago, IL; Cincinnati, OH; Columbus, OH; Dallas, TX; Denver, CO; Detroit, MI; Indianapolis, IN; Little Rock, AR; Los Angeles, CA; Louisville, KY; Orange County, CA; Orlando, FL; Phoenix, AZ; Raleigh-Durham, NC; Richmond, VA; San Francisco/San Jose, CA; Tampa Bay, FL; and Washington, DC Metro.

Are You Hunky Enough?

College Hunks Hauling Junk certainly has a provocative name, but that’s part of their success. Finding someone to haul away your junk isn’t that hard, but it’s really easy to go with the brand you recognize. College Hunks Hauling Junk is all about grabbing attention so that they’re the company that you choose when you need to get rid of some junk. It doesn’t hurt that they can call themselves green, as they recycle 60% of the junk that they collect. Now, College Hunks Hauling Junk obviously has plenty of jobs available. If you want to get in the business of hauling junk to pay your way through college, they can help, but they’re also a growing company with growing needs. They have a bunch of corporate job postings that consist solely of titles. Since they’re a college startup, it’s hard to say how much experience they’re looking for with each position, but you’ll have to apply to find out. The posted job titles include Truck Captain/ Wingman, VP – Franchise Development, Client Loyalty Associate (Inside Sales Rep), Operations Manager, VP – Marketing, VP – Public Relations, VP – Finance, VP – Business Development, and VP – Information Technology.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Have you used College Hunks Hauling Junk?

R/GA

Willy Franzen — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 15:52:52 +0000

It’s hard to imagine that a film production company could morph into “a holistic interactive agency built for a digital world;” however, that’s exactly what New York City’s R/GA has done. Now, film production and advertising aren’t all that different, but it’s still a big psychological leap from one to the other. Moreover, not many companies are willing to take a huge risk and move where innovation takes them. R/GA embraces change. They’re also really freakin’ good at what they do. Their clients include Nike, Verizon, IBM, Target, Bank of America, and a bunch of other extremely well known companies. They also have the best corporate website built in Flash that I’ve ever seen. Everything about it works—I can actually give you links to specific pages. Beyond that, the site does a fantastic job of presenting R/GA’s brand. It’s packed with information and has fantastic videos (they obviously haven’t abandoned film production completely).

Enroll at R/GA University

Everything that I’ve come across related to R/GA has impressed me. Their website. Their client list. Their portfolio. And even their Jobs page (powered by Jobvite—ok, I can’t link directly to the jobs, but the site is still very easy to use). Oh yeah, and don’t forget R/GA University. It’s R/GA’s take on continuing education for employees, and it includes six pillars: Professional Development, Industry Trends, Leadership Development, Inside R/GA, R/GA and You, and Work + Life Balance. They “believe that the broad base of courses piques curiosity and encourages people to try new things. And ultimately makes people more well rounded and better at their jobs.” You have to like the sound of that. Anyway, R/GA has more than 25 job openings, and a number of them seem suitable for new college grads. Entry level positions include: Junior Designer (London, UK), Associate Desktop Support Administrator (New York, NY), Junior Copywriter (New York, NY), Junior Open Standards Developer (New York, NY). They also have a San Francisco office, but no entry level positions posted there. You can apply for any of these jobs online, or you can post a résumé for an unlisted position to any of their departments.

Links to Help You Begin Your Research

Are you impressed with R/GA?