Google, Apple, Intel Among 20 Best Tech Companies to Work for in 2011

by Don E. Sears

Intel does well within various rankings as a top place to work. Intel ranked No. 62 on Fortune’s “100 Best Companies to Work For in 2010,” took No. 5 on Newsweek’s “Green Rankings” list of 500 U.S. companies for environmental commitments and made No. 36 on BusinessWeek’s “50 Best Places to Launch a Career” in 2008.

In 2009, Genentech merged with the Roche Group, but maintains strong recognition in the scientific, biotechnology, biopharmaceutical, pharmaceutical and related industries. Genentech ranked high on Science Magazine’s “2010 Top Employer” list, as well as making Fortune’s “100 Best Companies to Work For in 2010,” and No. 15 on Computerworld’s “100 Best Places to Work in IT.”

Beyond its technology accolades, including eWEEK’s “2010 Products of the Year” with Salesforce Chatter, Salesforce.com also ranks well with employees and publications that rate companies. It ranked No. 55 on Fortune’s “100 Best Companies to Work For” in 2009.

Adobe ranks well in North America. It was listed as one of the top companies to work for in Canada in 2009, the same year it took No. 42 in Fortune’s “100 Best Companies to Work For.”

The mobile communication experts at Qualcomm have made Fortune’s list of “100 Best Companies to Work For” for 12 years in a row.

Design and build company Fluor ranked No. 1 on Fortune’s “Engineering, Construction” industry list of America’s largest corporations for 2010, and is well-respected by its employees worldwide.

Search, advertising, applications and mobile development giant Google continues to rank well with employees year after year. In addition, Google is well-known for having some of the best benefits and perks of any company, including gourmet food and Segways. Google is acknowledged as being an amazing place to work for technologists.

Pharmaceutical giant Bristol-Myers Squibb ranks well in a number of employee-centric categories, with special recognition in gender equality. This includes 13 annual rankings in Working Mother Magazine’s “100 Best Companies” and recognition as a “Top 50 Company for Executive Women in 2010” by the National Association for Female Executives.

Mountain View, Calif.-based Synopsys is a leader in electronic design automation (EDA) and received a corporate award in 2010 from the IEEE Standards Association (IEEE-SA). The company also gets a big thumbs-up from a majority of its workers.

Signal-processing experts Analog Devices is no stranger to environmental and sustainability awards. ADI was recognized in 2007 by DesignNews for reducing carbon-based gases from its operations.

There is little surprise that Steve Jobs’ company, with the hottest consumer technology products and enormous accolades for design and functionality, would rank high with its employees. The company openly shirks typical corporate standards for work. Here’s an example: “A lot of big companies are about endless meetings. Massive bureaucracy. Executive parking spaces. And suits. We don’t see what any of that has to do with great work. So we don’t bother. This isn’t your cushy corporate nine-to-fiver. Fortunately.”

Six offices of National Instruments were recognized by the Great Place to Work Institute in 2009, and the company has been ranked as one of Fortune’s “100 Best Places to Work For” for 11 consecutive years including 2010.

Enterprise storage player NetApp ranked #7 on Fortune’s “100 Best Companies to Work For” in 2010, following its #1 placement in 2009.

Calling itself an “Internet-based social expression and personal publishing service,” the photo-sharing and printing company Shutterfly ranked as one of the top 25 medium-size companies to work for in the United States in 2010, according to the Great Place to Work Institute.

MITRE is a non-profit IT, systems engineering and innovation incubator working with the U.S. government. It’s also a powerhouse in workplace rankings, placing on the Fortune, Computerworld and Fast Company lists in 2010.

Slalom made the top 10 in Consulting Magazine’s “Best Firms to Work For” in 2010. The company is also a Microsoft “Business Intelligence Partner of the Year” winner.

The SAS Institute has ranked on Fortune’s “100 Best Companies to Work For” list for the past 13 years, and took the top honor in 2010.

Boston Consulting Group is one of only three companies to remain in the top 15 of Fortune’s “100 Best Places to Work” during the last five years. It also recorded a perfect score for the third year running in the Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Equality index.

Bain took the top ranking in Consulting Magazine’s 2010 “Best Firms,” as it has for eight years running. The Consulting Magazine’s editors wrote: “Bain’s survey results speak volumes. Best overall firm, top firm in the areas of Career Development, Work/Life Balance and The Job; second in Compensation & Benefits, Culture and Leadership. Keep in mind, more than 200 consulting firms took the survey.”

There is little left to say about the social networking behemoth that is Facebook. The only question is where will it be heading? From a well-regarded movie about its beginnings at Harvard, to infamous lawsuits, to Zuckerberg’s being Time Magazine’s “Person of the Year,” Facebook’s 25 percent stake of all Internet usage is a powerful force for users and employees alike.