I don't see why you would need a github profile, etc., for those things, and if you think that improving your public image as a developer will land you a job wi

I don't see why you would need a github profile, etc., for those things, and if you think that improving your public image as a developer will land you a job with such a company, you may be right, but I think you are looking at the problem the wrong way. Many jobs offer the last two things in your dream job. A few jobs offer one of the first two, often at the expense of the latter. A very few jobs offer all four. How do you expect to tell that a company has all of these attributes? Unless they are a very high-profile company, you have very few data points to go on. Just like you talk yourself up during an interview, the company will talk themselves up, and often misrepresent and overstate what they have to offer. Case in point, I'm actually in a somewhat similar situation, and am aggressively looking for an out. After returning to school to finish a degree I was hoping to take a different tack in my career. I really wanted to work on scientific applications with something more in mind than just the bottom line. I accepted a position that offered mostly remote work. They already have an established remote workforce, and it appeared to be a true meritocracy, with little management overhead or fixed structure, and lots of very bright talented people working on interesting projects. I had several interviews, including a day long in-person interview. I turned down three other very solid offers to take this job. Fast forward a few months and the picture they painted could not be further from reality. The people in the office don't have phones, so talking to them directly always involves jumping through hoops and can take a long time to set up. People are often unwilling to talk at all and prefer to hold terse conversations over IM. Lack of management structure translates to lack of communication and support from above. Some things about the job were grossly misrepresented and there was one major outright lie that would have been a deal-breaker from the start if I'd known about it. But the job looked perfect! I looked like a great fit to them! This is a career, don't count on a quick fix or finding nirvana in a day, or six months. A friend of mine used to say, life is the process of finding the things that don't work. If you put yourself 100% on the line hoping for a big payoff, you are more than likely not going to be happy with the result. Just look at how many startup founders on here have failed over and over before making it, and many never do. I see no reason to over-extend yourself like that for the sake of a salaried position, at least not without some really clear goal at the outset.