Startups are basically how the CEO or founder wants them to be so startups will be very different by nature as those guys typically march to the beat of their own drum so to speak.
I worked at a startup that was being courted by the same VS's that brought like eHarmony and many other big name sites public. It was a fun working atmosphere, in Chicago most of hte new web startups are all in the same area in River North.
The company I worked for was mostly younger, I would say most people under 30, all our programmers were 19-25 with the exception of the guy who headed that dept.
We had beer in hte office on Fridays on the companies dime, would do breakfast runs, eat lunch together, then go out for milkshakes at like 3pm and lots of people would do happy hours afterwork. It oftentimes tends to be a work together play together type atmosphere, some people love that and for a while I did but later I was kind of like I have my friends at home I work with you guys, I didn't really wanna spend all my time outside work going to happy hours and being on softball leagues.
One thing you'll either love or hate is unlike big corporate jobs where you have a very specific duty at a startup lots of times due to being smaller, newer, more agile your kind of a jack of all trades and could be doing all types of stuff.
The startup names you through out are actually pretty large and established but with a true startup your job security isn't that secure. The startup I was working at got hit really hard by the 2007-2008 recession and even guys who helped found the company were getting tossed to the side. I started as an intern, became a contract employee and was really freaking out about everyone else getting rich when they went public and me being left out in the cold so wound up getting another offer from a large travel site not really intending to take the job but just hoping it would put their feet to the fire and make them hire me nad they told me good luck at my new job so that was the end of that.
If you have any more specific questions feel free to ask and I'd be happy to answer
I worked at a startup that was being courted by the same VS's that brought like eHarmony and many other big name sites public. It was a fun working atmosphere, in Chicago most of hte new web startups are all in the same area in River North.
The company I worked for was mostly younger, I would say most people under 30, all our programmers were 19-25 with the exception of the guy who headed that dept.
We had beer in hte office on Fridays on the companies dime, would do breakfast runs, eat lunch together, then go out for milkshakes at like 3pm and lots of people would do happy hours afterwork. It oftentimes tends to be a work together play together type atmosphere, some people love that and for a while I did but later I was kind of like I have my friends at home I work with you guys, I didn't really wanna spend all my time outside work going to happy hours and being on softball leagues.
One thing you'll either love or hate is unlike big corporate jobs where you have a very specific duty at a startup lots of times due to being smaller, newer, more agile your kind of a jack of all trades and could be doing all types of stuff.
The startup names you through out are actually pretty large and established but with a true startup your job security isn't that secure. The startup I was working at got hit really hard by the 2007-2008 recession and even guys who helped found the company were getting tossed to the side. I started as an intern, became a contract employee and was really freaking out about everyone else getting rich when they went public and me being left out in the cold so wound up getting another offer from a large travel site not really intending to take the job but just hoping it would put their feet to the fire and make them hire me nad they told me good luck at my new job so that was the end of that.
If you have any more specific questions feel free to ask and I'd be happy to answer