Is going to a school that doesn't bring in big name companies for recruitment....

College Majors Engineering Majors
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<p>All that bad? Do just as secure and lucrative jobs exist outside of the big name corporations? What are the advantages of getting into the big name corporations?</p>

<p>The more financially viable colleges on my list I'm applying to sparingly have big names like Intel and GE, but not much more than that. While the higher ranked schools on my list have a bunch of career information listing loads of big names and recruitment but are going to be quite expensive COA...</p>

<p>Any input? The thing that really sets me wondering is that the great but not "amazing" schools on my list such as Stony and Rutgers career placement/recruitment statistics are sparse and barely help give me a picture of where they stand, while the upper tier schools of course make it blatantly obvious and with tons of statistics...</p>

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<p>I’d say it’s totally up to the company’s management, and not determine by the size of a company.</p>

<p>Some managements are not run by engineers. They might ignore the engineering.
Last year I attended a lecture talk where a professor from Columbia told us a few incidents related to “engineering and business ethics”. Some managers don’t give a damn about ethics, and they only care about money. Time is money. So very often the deadline is shorter than it needed to be. What is the outcome? failure. Who to blame? engineers.</p>

<p>One incident was a web application developer. While working on his assignment, he was offered another assignment that would take him at least 2 months to finish. The management said he must finished it within 7 days. He was fired because the customer was not satisfy. </p>

<p>Another incident would be people were poisoned because the management ignore the advices and complains from the workers. The entire management was brought to court. This, however, happened to a local company. </p>

<p>One more incident happened to a defense contractor. The management didn’t listen to the advice of the engineers, and shipped bad equipments to the USA military. It happened that the failure was not testable. It only happened under an extreme case, which finally happened one day when a marine squad went out for a training. Fortunately, no one was injured. Well, as soon as the management decided to ship them out, the engineers reported the problem to his managers, and of course, the head of this company. But his complain was turned down by the leadership. He continued to fight over the problem, trying to convince them the problem. He was fired at the end. </p>

<p>The good thing about big companies is usually the benefits that you get as an employee. Local company might not be able to offer those to every employees.</p>

<p>Size of a company does not always reflect the true nature of the company’s ethics, culture, and motivation.</p>

<p>Stony and Rutgers are very good schools. As far as I know, Stony’s recruitment is pretty good. </p>

<p>Google is lead by engineers and business experts. Good management studies what employees need, and what the management can offer.</p>

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<p>^That is very interesting to know</p>

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<p>I couldn’t find the name anymore, sorry… looked over columbia and couldn’t find him either
[Engr</a> 101 Friday talks](<a href=“http://www-cs.ccny.cuny.edu/~fenster/engr101/]Engr”>Engr 101 Friday talks)</p>

<p>I had this last year Fall. The content had been replaced with the Spring’s, and Fenster took the engineering ethic talk himself. I believe I know why… anyway</p>

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<p>OP - Most companies limit their active recruiting to a fixed number of schools - might be 2-3 for a small company or 15-30 for a multinational - and easily half of those schools will be selected based on proximity to their main offices(s) more than anything else. Recruiting events are mostly for selling you on the company, not the other way around, although some things are accelerated and there is always an advantage to that personal contact. If the companies you want are not recruiting at your school, check with them - they will certainly accept your resume online or by mail, and may have “open” recruiting events you can attend. One thing you might want to try is checking with the schools recruiting offices for specific events - find out who attended their last couple of job fairs, and see if there are any you would like to work for.</p>

<p>Secure and lucrative outside a big company? Yes and no. Big companies generally have more money, which means better pay and benefits. You can move around the company with more freedom (usually) and can advance a considerable distance based primarily on your ability. You will also have a more gentle learning curve, as they can spend a year or two training you, but you will also be pushed to specify in a relatively narrow specialty that may limit your career options should you decide to leave. They are only marginally more “secure” than small companies, as big companies themselves are pretty stable, but don’t necessarily pass that on to their employees - they may lay you off, sell off your business unit, reorganize you into disaster, etc.</p>

<p>Conversely, a smaller company will require more and pay less, but if the company goes big, so will you, something you cannot say about a multinational. You will also represent a larger portion of their talent, and may parlay that into things like meaningful stock options or ownership of your produced IP. The steep and wide learning curve can advance your knowledge much faster than you would see at a big company. You can rapidly run into advancement issues - there may only be one or two ranks above your own, and they might be filled by owners or their family. The big stability risk is in the success of the company - they will hold on to you tightly while they can, but the company itself is always in danger of folding.</p>

<p>I worked for both sizes at various points, and it is really hard to say that one is better than the other - it is really a personal preference. I can say for certain that there were people at each who loved their jobs, and others who hated them.</p>

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<p>Start your own engineering firm. More than likely you will fail but it’s a great way to learn.</p>

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<p>My son is a senior at Rutgers. Their Career Services helped him get a great internship this past summer and he already received a job offer from this company for next year.</p>