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you get the satisfaction of knowing you aren’t a complete tool bag every time you wake up in the morning. whilst everyone reading your blog has the exact opposite impression...
does this guy really that the economy tanking is somehow any better for startups than it is for bankers?
This guy is really ignorant. It's the same mentality that thinks the valley is impervious to bubbles and inflation. What? Really, "you get the satisfaction of knowing you aren’t a complete tool bag every time you wake up in the morning."... They may have lost their jobs, but you lose at life.
Go figure: 19 yr old php/python/actionscript hero at younoodle
The shift key really doesn't take that long to depress, I'm not sure how not using saves you time. I had the same realization, that I had better job security at a startup, when I revisited some people I left at uni doing postdocs.
Sure, you might be only funded for a year at a time, but at least the money runs out on a predetermined date rather than unexpectedly one Friday.
Maybe my experiences are just limited, though.
This guy is really ignorant. It's the same mentality that thinks the valley is impervious to bubbles and inflation. What? Really, "you get the satisfaction of knowing you aren’t a complete tool bag every time you wake up in the morning."... They may have lost their jobs, but you lose at life.
Here are my thoughts:
-I don't think I've ever heard of investment banking careers described as safe. When there's no deal flow, investment bankers are the first to go. If jobs could have finance betas (not software/website betas), investment banker would be around a 3.0 or higher, an accountant would be around a ~1.0, a nurse would be a 0.50 and a mailman would be a 0.25 (people have no idea how hard it is to get fired or laid off from a government job - reassignment is your friend).
-Market volatility, like a recession or oil prices affects nearly everyone directly or indirectly.
-You can "network" at any job, but I agree that it's probably easier to make friends faster at a startup due to the nature of the business. There's certainly myriad counterexamples, however.
-The tool bag line just made me laugh.
-Anecdotally, I think he's right about having a broader based skill set. Having had over 30 jobs (not a typo, I've worked since age 12) I've never picked up more useful skills in a shorter period than while at a startup. This could obviously vary.
-If you absolutely need to raise money as a startup, I think you're in one of the worst situations as capital is already drying up and people/institutions are becoming risk averse. Not good for startups.
-If you don't need to raise money and have enough savings/revenue to last for a year or two, I'm not sure if you're any better or worse off than anyone else. I'd like to hear what everyone else thinks on this.
-If you're young, without a family, sans serious medical conditions and geographically apathetic I'd argue you're better off working at an interesting startup for very cheap (stipend & equity & food & rent?) than you are taking a way-below market-compensation desk job. Why? Upside.
The lack of capitalization within the post and ping pong rub-in certainly doesn't help the cause, but I'm sure Sam has already figured that out. At least he inspired some interesting conversation; I've really enjoyed this thread.
Edit: Andr had some of the same points I did and posted before me. We've obviously both had a lot of exposure to the fun filled monkey business of finance.
This guy is really ignorant. It's the same mentality that thinks the valley is impervious to bubbles and inflation. What? Really, "you get the satisfaction of knowing you aren’t a complete tool bag every time you wake up in the morning."... They may have lost their jobs, but you lose at life.
I think that's what this guy is doing. He's young, he's confident (to a point), but he lacks the wisdom and ability to reflect that comes with age.
So while it's easy to call him "ignorant", a "douche bag", or whatever - he's not willingly being any of those things. He's young, cocky, and exuberant - like most of us were.
(Of course, when /we/ were acting the same way, we were probably getting called out the same way too.. so this process might actually be necessary to develop that wisdom ;-))
The shift key really doesn't take that long to depress, I'm not sure how not using saves you time. I had the same realization, that I had better job security at a startup, when I revisited some people I left at uni doing postdocs.
This guy is really ignorant. It's the same mentality that thinks the valley is impervious to bubbles and inflation. What? Really, "you get the satisfaction of knowing you aren’t a complete tool bag every time you wake up in the morning."... They may have lost their jobs, but you lose at life.
I didn't sit back, and chuckle when I saw 20,000 people potentially lose their jobs. Even if you don't like Wall Street, you don't want to see that many people looking for work all of a sudden.