Working at startup sucks. Lower pay, lower stability, overworked, much higher risk for the company to go bust. There is literally no benefit apart from the fact that the bar is somewhat lower and easier to get a job
Want to found a startup? Work at one first
131–140 of 156 posts
Re: Want to found a startup? Work at one first
#132"Want to get to point X? Visit point Y first!"
Just go to point X directly. Too many people shy away from their dreams and delay, because they want to learn first, practice first, and get ready before the real adventure. You will never deplete "more things to learn". You are only depleting your lifetime. And no matter how close working at a startup is to working on a startup, it will never be as close to it as itself.
If you need to save up some money or take care of any other blockers first for your own safety, fine. If there is a great company working on a great problem that you are excited by, great. But if you want to start a new company, then working at a startup is not a practice for starting a new startup. It is a practice for working at a startup and a practice for wasting another day of your life not living the way you really want to live.
Re: Want to found a startup? Work at one first
#133I wish I had had that opportunity back in 1985 when I founded my first one, but being outside of the Bay Area (as in 1500 miles away) there were basically no software startups at all, and with no internet/web/ycombinator etc, no way to learn anything except by trying and failing. We did ship our product, do marketing, make some sales but not enough so we had to sell the product and close down. Today I know all things…
That bank quote is too funny! What was the product if one may ask?
A rather unique take on spreadsheets that would wind up influencing others to try experimentations on the spreadsheet idea, but all were ultimately killed by Excel, as what happened to us. Search "trapeze spreadsheet" on google if you care to know more.
Re: Want to found a startup? Work at one first
#134If you lack the confidence to start a startup then working at one can help you gain than to create one in the future. But I'm not confident it increases the chances the company is going to be successful. Actually if you had the chance to work at a company that became a unicorn, you will have better chance to get founding which increase the chance that your company is going to work, so yeah. Except for that confidence…
Another massive advantage is finding cofounders and employees from the pool of people you work with and meet.
I think that is the best way to find suitable people outside your specialty where you can properly judge people’s integrity, ability, and their match with you (working style, filling the holes in your skills, compatibility, boss vs employee).
I have done this, no I have seen other successful entrepreneurs do it.
Re: Want to found a startup? Work at one first
#135I don't think it even has to be at a startup. Just having some actual job experience in general goes a long way.
Re: Want to found a startup? Work at one first
#136I've worked at multiple startups sub 50 to >1000 (unicorn status) and have founded and sold my own company. I've also worked at a few of the FAANGs. This is common advice, especially among VCs since it's one of the key benefits used to pitch prospective employees on giving up that fat FAANG salary, but in my personal experience, it's not so cut and dry. Working in a startup will brand you as a startup person and help…
I'm not sure I agree with the comparison of picking a start-up to join being the same as one you might invest in. At least, in terms of this article, a start-up that has growth ambitions and has just raised a round is a great bet. Unlike a potential investor, you didn't need to get in before that round to make the investment worthwhile, and in a sense you don't care as much about the company itself being an outsized…
The point is that the valuable lessons and growth on how to effectively build a successful startup only occurs at those high success high growth companies. I've been at successes and failures. You learn much more from success.
Re: Want to found a startup? Work at one first
#137"Want to get to point X? Visit point Y first!" Just go to point X directly. Too many people shy away from their dreams and delay, because they want to learn first, practice first, and get ready before the real adventure. You will never deplete "more things to learn". You are only depleting your lifetime. And no matter how close working at a startup is to working on a startup, it will never be as close to it as itself…
I like this idea. It might be like the best exercise for sport x is to play sport x.
And if you fail, you already worked at a startup (by founding it)
Re: Want to found a startup? Work at one first
#138Earlier quoted context omitted.
There is way more than one lesson to learn from each startup. You will hopefully learn how to hire (and possibly fire) people. You will get insight into the nitty gritty of keeping the lights on at a company (taxes, payroll, office leases, etc...), and you will get familiar with the typical fundraising cycle. Most people don't appreciate how fast 18 months to two years of funding can run out. Going through that stuff…
Is working at a startup useful? Yes. Is more more useful than having a longer runway from big co savings? Doubtful. Most of the lessons you learn are either going to be 1. General startup lessons (This information is available in YC Startup School, lean startup, etc...) 2. Lessons specific to the problem you're trying to solve (Whats the best way to reach rural RV buyers, what keeps people from renting a room for a n…
> Is more more useful than having a longer runway from big co savings? Doubtful.
Having worked at a startup before, I now know to never risk a substantial amount of my own money on the venture. The risk of failure is too high. I would either a) go the side project->bootstrap route or b) have angel or accelerator money lined up, which should be easy because having worked at a startup before, my network now includes angel investors.
> This information is available in YC Startup School, lean startup, etc...
I have participated in Startup School. It certainly has some value, but it is in no way a substitute for working at a startup. Not even close. Also, your competitors have access to the same resources, so it is not exactly a competitive edge.
> Whats the best way to reach rural RV buyers, what keeps people from renting a room for a night
That is called marketing and market research. Almost every startup in existence does it. And if you work at a startup, you will get a close up look at how it is done, and you will get some valuable lessons on what to do and what not to do. And having worked at a startup, I now also have a list of potential freelancers in case I wanted to contract that work out.
Re: Want to found a startup? Work at one first
#139I've worked at multiple startups sub 50 to >1000 (unicorn status) and have founded and sold my own company. I've also worked at a few of the FAANGs. This is common advice, especially among VCs since it's one of the key benefits used to pitch prospective employees on giving up that fat FAANG salary, but in my personal experience, it's not so cut and dry. Working in a startup will brand you as a startup person and help…
I agree you can learn many lessons about what not to do. The broader point I'm making here is that there's a billion things not to do and a few things you should do. The successful startups will also make mistakes, iterate, and teach you the things not to do but teach you how to figure out what you should be doing. The unsuccessful ones just stubbornly plod forward and you, the employee, just know you guys screwed it up, but have no idea how to find success.
TL;DR YMMV, but it's much more valuable to learn a selection of "winning moves" you can apply than it is to learn a bunch of "losing moves" not to apply.
Re: Want to found a startup? Work at one first
#140I've worked at multiple startups sub 50 to >1000 (unicorn status) and have founded and sold my own company. I've also worked at a few of the FAANGs. This is common advice, especially among VCs since it's one of the key benefits used to pitch prospective employees on giving up that fat FAANG salary, but in my personal experience, it's not so cut and dry. Working in a startup will brand you as a startup person and help…
+1 Don't think this working for a startup offers much advantage for an engineer if they later decide to work on their own.
If you already know programming, there isn't a lot of value add that couple years of startup experience offers in terms of your programming skills.
The skills that you don't have -- Sales, marketing, hiring -- you will still not have. Working for a startup, as say, a frontend engineer for couple years does not help you get better at Sales. You'll need to hire for them or rely on co-founders anyway. The "wearing multiple hats" trope is extremely over hyped in my experience.