21–30 of 43 posts
How about:
1) Get a job.
Fin.
Or, could it be, that a startup failure descends upon one with such shocking repercussions, that one forgets how to tend for himself?
Yeah, another shameless rant from me. It's just rather disappointing seeing such useful material on the front page, that is.
I found that having a failed startup was good resume fodder to some extent. I was worth more in the marketplace after my failed startup, since I was perceived as having a more versatile skill set. (It helped that my failed startup, while financially a failure, was cool and helped me demo a lot of advanced coding skills. :) But I did run into a personal problem: after being a startupper, I found it very hard to transi…
I always think of them as the perfect example of "the interview is for you to learn about the company and the company to learn about you."
One thing being in a small startup teaches is versatility, you can vastly expand the breadth of your skillset in an environment where you have to perform, even if some of your core skills languish a bit.
It's hard to get this across in a resume, but do put them down. Are you a coder than ended up spending a few hours a week on sales? Put it down. Marketing guy who got roped into server administration? Put it down.
When applying for a place, just simply reorder those various hats you wore in your old startup to suit the position you are applying for. Put the most relevant ones at the top of the list and the least relevant ones nearer the bottom.
It can definitely take some getting used to, going back to working for somebody else, you feel like you've lost lots of autonomy -- you might even have to take what feels like a couple steps back. But you can turn that on its head and use your broad skillset to quickly move up the ranks. You can do the job they hired you for and, oh yeah, you can do these other half dozen jobs competently, should you just be in charge of the whole group then since you know what everybody does and can reach across and down as needed?
also get used to befuddling even competent recruiters, at one startup I did almost every job in the place at one time or another, when looking for a new job it drove the recruiters crazy trying to place me
Shouldn't just be a question for post-failure, but any sort of post-startup job. I've bounced back and forth between startups and bigCo my entire career. Or as I like to call it, moments of stark frenzied terror sandwiched between years of immense boredom. One thing being in a small startup teaches is versatility, you can vastly expand the breadth of your skillset in an environment where you have to perform, even if…
also get used to befuddling even competent recruiters, at one startup I did almost every job in the place at one time or another, when looking for a new job it drove the recruiters crazy trying to place me
The day job is driving me nuts. I thought at first that I could easily give it a year and a half, but now I'm counting the days to when the financial mess will have cleared up enough to resign - 2 more months. Maybe it's the company I'm working for (evil banking software), but more likely it's me. I have great difficulty working for someone else on one small part of a huge, 10 year old product.
Over the past 4 months I've drawn up a detailed plan for the new product that I released last year, and I'm sure it's going to work (heard that before). Roll on July 1st. I feel bad about the company I'm now working for, knowing that I'll be resigning soon and that I'm effectively using them, but not bad enough to stay.
I'm four months into a new corporate job after running into financial problems towards the end of last year. I didn't shut my business down, but things had gotten very dicey financially, making it necessary to get a regular pay check. I don't do much work on my own business these days (desktop, not web, and few support issues to handle), but I do have one product released late last year that is starting to show real…
The best way to get almost any job is to knowing someone who already works there. It is old advice, but it is probably the best, it is easier to get your foot in the door when they already have someone to vouch for you. In other words, while you are working on that startup, dont forget to keep in touch with people and look for new friends in your field of interest, it will go a long way.
Shouldn't just be a question for post-failure, but any sort of post-startup job. I've bounced back and forth between startups and bigCo my entire career. Or as I like to call it, moments of stark frenzied terror sandwiched between years of immense boredom. One thing being in a small startup teaches is versatility, you can vastly expand the breadth of your skillset in an environment where you have to perform, even if…
also get used to befuddling even competent recruiters, at one startup I did almost every job in the place at one time or another, when looking for a new job it drove the recruiters crazy trying to place me I had this problem - recruiters want a job title to pigeon hole you with. Their brains explode when they can't do this.
I've since changed it to "Everything, but tell me what you're looking for and I'll tell you about my experiences in that realm."
The best way to get almost any job is to knowing someone who already works there. It is old advice, but it is probably the best, it is easier to get your foot in the door when they already have someone to vouch for you. In other words, while you are working on that startup, dont forget to keep in touch with people and look for new friends in your field of interest, it will go a long way.
This advice works best when the person you know is directly responsible for running the company but gets less and less useful the further you get from that point.