Creative talent network Working Not Working has released the results of its annual survey of the most coveted jobs in the creative industry. And guess what? Everyone still wants to work at Nike. The top 50 list includes all of your regular faves, to a bit of a disappointing degree—Nike, Wieden + Kennedy, Google, Apple, and Droga5 fill the top five, with Google Creative Lab, Pentagram, and Netflix following close behind. According to WNW, 19 companies have been included in the list all five years they’ve been making it, and all of the top 10 this year are among those old reliables. We find ourselves wishing, once again, that these companies weren’t so completely predictable. Last year there were at least some curveballs—Adult Swim was number four, and ad agency Anomaly was number eight. This year’s list has us wondering, are the top companies that creatives want to work for always going to be the biggest, the most monied, and the ones you most expect?
To be sure, WNW’s sample size is impressive: it surveyed 50,000 people from the network, over 130 companies. It also makes sense that WNW’s network skews advertising—many of the companies WNW boasts helping to staff are on the list. But it is surprising that designers are clamoring to work for Facebook, for example (especially in this political climate, and after the headlines of 2018) and that all of the companies creatives find most prestigious are so huge. On the other hand, some more interesting companies did make runner-up—with film distribution and production company A24, design agencies frog and Mother, and Marvel Studios among them. And while Nike at number one isn’t exactly news, it is nice to know that some social awareness factored in. Of those polled, 74% responded that Nike’s recent Colin Kaepernick ad makes them more likely to take a job at the sports behemoth. Maybe it’s not all about name recognition and six figure salaries, after all.