Suggested Reading
In the last few months, there have been quite a few really great articles floating around about being a software engineer, getting hired, self-promotion and strengths and weaknesses of a few major companies. Not being one to typically pay much attention to the blag-a-sphere, I've been caught pleasantly surprised. Check them out.
In "Don't Call Yourself a Programmer" Patrick McKenzie writes to politely thrust unsuspecting college aged "Computer Scientists" into the real world. Letting them know just what does and doesn't matter. He does a great job pointing out a few shortcomings of higher education and the people who have experienced little else. It is an important piece of perspective, sprinkled with a few great tips.
In Patrick's article he references a few others, one of which really resonated with what I have observed. "FizzBizz" by Jeff Atwood, describes the pain of finding Software Engineers that are capable of coding. I realize that this one has been around for a while, but its new to me, so its possible that you haven't read it either. If you're in a position to hire Software Engineers, read it.
The final article is, now famously known as "Steve's Rant" (re-posted here). A decent tirade about the development, product, platform vision at companies including Amazon.com, Apple, Facebook, Microsoft and Google. It's a rant, but Steve does a pretty good job of pointing that out.