https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-best-way-to-start-my-caree...
http://www.businessinsider.com/zenefits-ceo-rescinds-job-off...
A ceo who isn't a prick might have said we understand your concerns: here's [blah blah blah] reasons that our work is more technically challenging than it may appear from the outside or from your limited time interviewing here, and it's a personal and/or company goal to be recognized for the quality of our technical achievements as a peer of google.
I happen to think that zenefits is not particularly technically challenging and is mostly wiring together integrations with 3rd party systems, but I'm open to being wrong. Nonetheless, this might have won them the employee without being a dick.
He made a public spectacle out of something small and he paid the price in bad publicity. But I've seen worse, by so-called pros. Sometimes people let their ego get the best of them. But that doesn't mean that every decision they've made is invalid.
College is a prime example of this. Why are certain schools (Ivys, primarily) so highly recognized? Do they universally have better programs? Sometimes, sure, but so much of their cache comes exclusively from the institution itself being a signaling mechanism of exclusivity, and as was put, "buzzwordyness".
In my view, it would be irresponsible to NOT consider any potential added value of positions when comparing them. You are not doing a disservice to either company or your own integrity as an engineer as long as the work you do is sound, and to suggest that you should put your own best interests aside because a given metric isn't "tasteful" seems shortsighted. (I do not mean to suggest that hopping companies to ride trends is something to be looked up to, but that when you make a decision, the more data that helps you obtain a positive outcome the better.)
Everyone can, and should, consider how a job will help them advance their own careers. This is exactly why I quit COMPANY_X. At the time, their codebase was entirely based on not one, but two obsolete technology stacks. If I didn't leave quickly, I would have been locked into that narrow ecosystem for the rest of my life, at a "flattened" company with almost zero opportunity for career advancement. It would have been almost like someone deciding to move into COBOL programming starting in 2016.
And I have been frequently laid off as a result of startup failure, acquisition redundancy, or just the company's loss of contract work. There is no longer any loyalty from the typical employer to the typical employee. If you can manage to work your entire career at a single company, you are an extreme outlier, because at many, if an accountant predicts you will be unprofitable next week, you will get laid off on Friday afternoon, with no severance package.
So asking yourself "would this look good on my resume?" is something you should do very frequently, even if you are currently content where you are. We wouldn't need to chase after buzzword-related experience if HR didn't look at those buzzwords when hiring people!
And anecdotally, the name of a previous employer has helped me to get hired at another company. After COMPANY_X, my future co-workers told me at the interview, "COMPANY_X is great! We know they hire only high-quality people, and we also know that the best all want to leave after about two years. PERSON_1 and PERSON_2 used to work there!"