Many of America’s ‘best and brightest’ are moving to the Web. The Wall Street Journal describes it as the ‘seismic shift shaking every corner of corporate America, reflecting the forceful pull of the Web.”[i]
“It’s all part of the technology fever striking college graduates the way the Gold Rush once hit fortune-seeking prospectors. Tech is hip and edgy and has an attraction so strong that many recent students are snubbing Corporate America to join or launch Internet start-ups,” says USA Today.[ii]
“The meek didn’t inherit the earth – the geeks did. The Forbes 400 now includes more engineers than movie moguls.” [iii]
The Managing Editor of Fortune Magazine described the dance of hiring the best talent to the magazine as: “an elaborate act of seduction – somewhere between, say, recruiting college athletes and selling penny stocks over the phone.”[iv]
Randy Komisar in a recent Harvard Business Review article described the new non-career in this way: “Conventional careers require that you put one foot in front of the other, steady as you go. First you can get one kind of experience, then you get another. Inch by inch, you march forward. The non-career career doesn’t involve much marching. Instead, when opportunity calls, you leap. And when opportunity dries up, you move on. You also tango, roll around in the mud, and jump for joy. It all depends on where you have taken yourself.”[v]
[i] Lipin, Steven and Pacelle, Mitchell, “KKR Partner Exits, Signs on ‘Dot-Com Line,” Wall Street Journal, November 30, 1999. p. C1.
[ii] Armour, Stephanie, “Tech Grads Loving Life: Pizza, Jeans, Happy Hour,” USA Today, June 21, 1999, p. 1B.
[iii] Kaplan, David, “The Silicon Boys,” Newsweek, June 14, 1999, p. 49.
[iv] Huey, John, “Just in Time Hiring,” Fortune Magazine, April 3, 2000.
[v] Komisar, Randy, “Goodbye Career, Hello Success,” Harvard Business Review, March/April, 2000.