Job search.
A quarter of young professionals in the US want to work for Google, according to a new survey.
Consulting group Universum, which was set up to aid companies in boosting their desirability to attract new workers, found that almost 25 percent of respondents picked Google as their employer of choice, almost twice as many as those that picked Apple, The WSJ reported.
Walt Disney, the US State Department and Amazom.com rounded off the top 5, 3 of which were obviously tech or web companies.
Universum reportedly surveyed 10,306 young professionals who had graduated and had between 1 and 8 years in the workplace, to compile a list of the US' 150 most attractive companies to work for.
Respondents could also apparently add companies they wanted to work for that were not included on the list and the three most added were: Facebook, the Department of Homeland Security and the UN.
Kasia Do, a project manager for Universum told the newspaper that young professionals want to work for firms that they like as consumers, while many are drawn to typically large businesses that offer great job security.
Google is believed to be incredibly careful to project an appealing image to young potential employees. Yolanda Mangolini, director of outreach programs for Google, reportedly said that it regularly hosts open days and tech talks in the areas it wants to recruit in, which she said are "incredibly powerful" in helping young professionals imagine themselves at Google.
The company also uses blogs, tweets and YouTube videos to show off its job perks and lifestyle.
Government agencies reportedly played a large part in making up the remainder of the top 10, which Do speculates might be because they are relatively recession-proof and have not made as many redundancies as some firms in the private sector. NASA, the FBI and CIA all grabbed a place in the top 10.
Jon Picoult of brand consultant Watermark Consulting told The WSJ: "Those government agencies can articulate a reason for being that gives employees a sense of purpose. For young people looking to make a difference in the world, they have a good story to tell."
Interestingly, while tech firms are obviously appealing to young professionals, it is reported that few of the people wanting to work at big name companies such as Google have the skills to do so.
The Education Department reportedly said that the top majors in the class of 2008 were business, healthy sciences, social sciences and history...so not maths and computer science.
In fact, about 9 times as many people majored in business in 2008 as they did in computer science, it added.
