[swishhboy25]

I was wondering if anyone had experience working at a startup company, that grew and eventually became successful.

I'm writing because I've recently been introduced to someone in charge of HR at a prominent startup(Think Spotify, Uber, Airbnb, etc) through networking, and was in the midst of reaching out to the person when I feel like I had to ask myself the question: What's it like to work at a prominent startup, and what kind of things could I learn from it?

I'm applying for an internship at the company and don't quite know the best way to reach out to my connection.

Experiences/anecdotes would really be appreciated.

[Independent1]

I am currently working for a startup recruitment company. This is technically my first real job, other than an internship.

I'm one year in and we are slowly expanding our headcount, what I can tell you from my experience is that hard work is crucial to survive, this is obvious for starts ups at the early stage though. I feel that the long hours and payment sacrifice (I could have got a job in the U.K earning pretty much double what I am now, but I saw this as a long term investment) really have been a good starting block in terms of work effort, responsibilities, personal devlopment and acquiring skills. The responsibilities I have right now are much more than I would get at my age (23) working for a bigger and established company, and these will only increase as we continue to get bigger.

You should ask yourself the following before considering working for a startup:

- What will be your role & responsibilities? I am currently in charge of all the companies sales operations, and the developing sales team will be managed by me. I meet senior level executives from both SMEs to MNCs & negotiate contracts etc. These are tasks and opportunities that I wouldn't have the chance to experience as an entry level employee in a normal company.

- Are you in it for long or short term? The answer here should almost always be long term (a few years at least), it makes no sense to get involved in a startup and leave the company as soon as or just before it expands and becomes succesful.

- How well do you know the boss? Do you trust him? Being baited into a job with unrealistic possibilities and rewards is something that may occur. You could be promised terms that act as a trap in order to make you motivated and perform.


In terms of priority, I strongly believe that the experience and skills acquirement is greater than the money earnt (in most cases) during the beginning stage of your career.

[RockHard]

I've worked for 3 startups.

The first was right when the Internet was going big (mid 90's). It was a decent idea but the company was a bunch of idiots. Bad engineering, bad management - then they hired some guys who were smart but didn't deliver. All talk and no product. I was in the middle of this, junior programmer with 2 years experience, but after 15 months it was clear where it was going, and I bailed.

2nd was with a friend's company. He'd just got VC money and hired some guys. His initial product was neat but I got on board when he did v2 and it looked really cool. It was cool at the time. Company had an "us against the world" feel. The engineering wasn't awesome, but I liked the team. The problems were that we were doing social networking really early on and weren't pushing the right buttons to engage users, and the founder didn't think big enough. We were handling a LOT of data - this is right when "big data" was starting up - we'd read the G-table and MapReduce papers and go try to talk to the boss about doing something like that, but he wanted to throw it all in an RDBMS and build a traditional 3 tier architecture. The funny thing is after a couple years, he started talking to MySpace and it was clear where this would all end up, both technologically and business-wise.

3rd company I came in late stage. 3rd round of VC funding I think. Still felt like a startup, huge growth, great team. Not the most talented group, but extremely dedicated. Eventually the company went public, we've done well. My options paid off well. Not Fuck You money, but it's a life-changing amount.

My general advice is
1. Know who you're getting in bed with. You will need to trust the team, and you need to be able to rely on their dedication. It's really hard being the only guy on a team who really gives a fuck.
2. Really, really believe in the product. You should be working on something that you would be using anyway. If it's some abstract thing that you don't care about, it won't work. You need to be involved at the level that you're online at 11PM using the product you made because you want to. So ask yourself - is this one of these "that sounds like a good idea" companies? Or is it a product that you want to go use right now if you don't already?
2a. That said, there are some great areas that you won't really care about unless you're a doctor or truck driver or whatever. You'll still need to build empathy with those people because the best software comes from people who are solving problems they're directly interested in. I think this kind of thing is really untapped, but there's a deeper level of networking involved. Side point - the 3rd company I worked for, when I was hired, if you worked there you either were related to the founder, went to church with someone who already worked there, or had extensive prior work experience with someone in the company. That company was very much organically built. They had minimal HR and did not use contractors or talent scouts.
3. Direction from the execs should be consistent. Startups will change direction for good reasons (I've heard a few stories of companies changing direction radically and doing well), but you have to watch out for the flavor of the week. People throw around ideas like "agile" thinking it's an excuse to not build a plan an execute it. Just be careful. The best founders have a great vision and don't usually change direction. I mean, if you start off building a Magic the Gathering trading card site and end up trying to do currency trading, it's probably going to end badly. A really early stage startup, you should be able to interview with the founder(s). Talk to these people, they should leave you feeling like you absolutely have to do this or you'll regret it. Their enthusiasm should be contagious.

[Tactician]

Hi, I'm very sleepy so please verify this from another source (not a good way to start a reply...)

I just want to warn you against any delusions of promotion simply because you were an early employee.

Stock generally goes to the founding person(s), and everyone else is replaceable, unless you're lucky. The word here is lucky. You have to be lucky to have a boss that recognizes your talent (applies in every job), and even more lucky to have a boss that cares (due to a soft spot, basically) that you've been around for a long enough time to see the company grow.

Because of this consideration, if you aren't very difficult for your employing startup to replace, and further combined with the often hectic environment and volatile nature of a startup, from a purely economical perspective, I would lean towards working at a well established company since working at a startup often won't get you financial recognition in the case that the company takes off (the environment can be fun, but financially it is not the best choice barring a lot of luck). That sentence was very long, sleepy.

My source would be owning a startup and also Larry Elison firing a bunch of people just as their stocks were about to mature. To a replaceable employee, successful startups are probably more cutthroat. If anyone disagrees, please please call me out on it, as I may have spoken in error or there may be ways that working at a startup as a replaceable employee can be gamed to be very profitable.

[selftaught]

I'm in year 2 of working at a startup.. before I took the position I found this website that answered a lot of questions: https://startupsanonymous.com/

From what I've read, as an employee, your compensation should be in line with what you could get in the open market, especially if your equity stake is low to none. I'm not a founder but as the first employee hired I was given a small equity stake (low single digits).

I agree with RockHard on his #2 point about believing in the product, although your enthusiasm will likely trend down/up over the course of development.. In my personal experience it is more important to have confidence in your company leadership and their vision, like RockHard says in #1.. I vaguely remember a quote that you should bet on people and not products.. something like that. But you've got to be able to handle the swings from when you have a breakthrough to suffering setbacks.. At a startup there is always the looming threat of running out of money, becoming technologically obsolete, losing out to competition, etc. And the founders will always be spewing out sunshine and roses so it can be hard to gauge how well the company is progressing.

[bacardi123]

count me in . i am always working on one...or more like: always working on tens of them

[monster]

(12-21-2014 10:25 PM)swishhboy25 Wrote:  

I'm writing because I've recently been introduced to someone in charge of HR at a prominent startup(Think Spotify, Uber, Airbnb, etc) through networking, and was in the midst of reaching out to the person when I feel like I had to ask myself the question: What's it like to work at a prominent startup, and what kind of things could I learn from it?

Have the skills they need specifically .There are a ton of people who do "social media marketing" or PR or whatever. But many of them suck and are generalists. We live in a world of specialists who succeed. Have SPECIFIC projects and milestones that you've worked on and achieved and can explain exactly how you did it, what challenges you faced and how you succeeded.

Also be persistent. The squeeky wheel gets the grease. But don't be needy. Sorta like with girls

[fucksong]

I've worked for 4 startups all in the late 90's dot com boom and will never ever ever work for another one again. A few of these companies had the backing of cats like Morgan Stanley, Benchmark (guys who backed Ebay) . Ask the false hopes of millions from worthless stock options, being overworked, hahaha.

My opinion is if your position will be something that you actually enjoy life say some kind of designing, or you really really REALLY LOVE technology, I wish you the best. Otherwise . Go travel the world and meet hot exotic women in the other side of the world that you'll barely ever see in Man Jose or Manta Clara or wherever else in silicon valley

[OSL]

-

FuckSong is right. Don't join a tech company with the hopes of cashing out on your options. It's generally only the founders and MAYBE employees 1-5 who end up making any sort of money from startups - if the startup even gets acquired.

I've never interned or worked for one of those big startups but I've run my own startups - mostly bootstrapped, occasionally VC or angel funded - and I can relate to what this poster is saying.

If you are going to get a job with someone like Airbnb or Uber, do it for the experience of building teams and scaling. Don't do it with the expectation of cashing out huge if you are not a founder of that company.

It is extremely rare that anyone but the cofounders cash out in a serious way - and even the chances of that happening are often prohibitively rare.

Internships with big tech startups/companies are fine as long as you are doing it for the experience and as a means to an end.

As fuckSong said, you should know what you're getting yourself into and do it because you love it.

Also, as fuckSong also said, there is absolutely no reason you need to be in silicon valley to do it. I think one of the only good things about silicon valley is that it's a great marketplace for acquisitions to happen. Beyond that, it's hard to justify being an early stage founder getting your prototype and product market fit secured.....while living in some ratty $3K/month roach infested apartment.

I know you're young. Do an internship at one of these places just to see what it's like and because you're curious about the space. This is the right time in your life to be experimenting and looking around to see what sort of career is a good fit for you.

Get a mentor while your'e there and make connections with people. Also, network aggressively with the engineers there and try to befriend them and add value to their lives. You might need to poach one of them later if you wanna do a startup or need employees.

Don't expect to become a millionaire unless you are the founder of your own company and have control of it all the way until the end.

My two cents.

-

[swishhboy25]

Thank you all for your valuable feedback. I'll post as more updates come along.

[ColSpanker]

Good posts. I recently interviewed for a sales position with a start-up and am waiting to hear back. The guy doesn't have a lot of $$$- I saw the ad on Craig's List, so that should tell you something. Nice dude with a wife and multiple kids, but I've been porked by too many nice people before. Still waiting to hear back, but usually these sales jobs on CL go nowhere, even the legit ones.

[OSL]

(12-24-2014 09:24 AM)ColSpanker Wrote:  

Good posts. I recently interviewed for a sales position with a start-up and am waiting to hear back. The guy doesn't have a lot of $$$- I saw the ad on Craig's List, so that should tell you something. Nice dude with a wife and multiple kids, but I've been porked by too many nice people before. Still waiting to hear back, but usually these sales jobs on CL go nowhere, even the legit ones.

The startups to take seriously would be recruiting you through Angel List.

http://www.angel.co

I've been getting hit up by recruiters in SF/NY non-stop and I'm not even in the US.

I suggest you create and spruce up an Angel List profile.

-

[ColSpanker]

(12-24-2014 09:58 AM)YMG Wrote:  

(12-24-2014 09:24 AM)ColSpanker Wrote:  

Good posts. I recently interviewed for a sales position with a start-up and am waiting to hear back. The guy doesn't have a lot of $$$- I saw the ad on Craig's List, so that should tell you something. Nice dude with a wife and multiple kids, but I've been porked by too many nice people before. Still waiting to hear back, but usually these sales jobs on CL go nowhere, even the legit ones.

The startups to take seriously would be recruiting you through Angel List.

http://www.angel.co

I've been getting hit up by recruiters in SF/NY non-stop and I'm not even in the US.

I suggest you create and spruce up an Angel List profile.

-

Thanks. I'm looking at that site again. Doesn't seem to be too much down here in Philly.

[OSL]

(12-24-2014 10:48 AM)ColSpanker Wrote:  

(12-24-2014 09:58 AM)YMG Wrote:  

(12-24-2014 09:24 AM)ColSpanker Wrote:  

Good posts. I recently interviewed for a sales position with a start-up and am waiting to hear back. The guy doesn't have a lot of $$$- I saw the ad on Craig's List, so that should tell you something. Nice dude with a wife and multiple kids, but I've been porked by too many nice people before. Still waiting to hear back, but usually these sales jobs on CL go nowhere, even the legit ones.

The startups to take seriously would be recruiting you through Angel List.

http://www.angel.co

I've been getting hit up by recruiters in SF/NY non-stop and I'm not even in the US.

I suggest you create and spruce up an Angel List profile.

-

Thanks. I'm looking at that site again. Doesn't seem to be too much down here in Philly.

The closest serious startup hub to you is NYC. You should look into getting recruited at some shops up there. The scene is becoming a force to reckon with, although nothing globally compares with SFBA yet.

It's only $10-20 USD for a Bolt Bus ride to NYC and like two hours?

Worth the trip. First round interview will usually be skype and then second is in-person. Try it out - at worst you will get experience interviewing with startups and a trip to NYC out of it.

-

[jewjitsu]

I currently work at a mature start up that is doing very well. I previously worked at another start up that had a lot of success initially but didn't evolve with it's competition and ultimately went belly up. If you are looking at going into an early stage startup, it is especially important that you really believe in their product or the problem that they are offering a solution to. Like others have said, it's the founders and early team members that really stand to cash out on stock options. Later employee's may make some money but it won't be never-work-again money. So if your jumping into an early startup, make sure it's worth your time investment. Culturally most startups tend to be work-hard-play-hard kind of places, which sounds nice but has a definite down side.

For me these are the main pro's and con's of the start up world.

Pros
- Good Compensation w/ chance of stock options
- Lots of free food, drinks, and parties
- Flexible work environment ( nobody checking when you come or go as long as your work gets done )
- opportunity to advance, implement ideas regardless of seniority

Cons
- The majority of the staff, especially on the engineering side, consists of nerdy white, asian, and Indian dudes and that will likely be the same at most conferences and industry events.
- The company can go belly up or majorly downsize at anytime + general boom/bust cycle in the tech industry
- When things get busy you'll be expected to put in whatever time is necessary to get stuff done - downside of work-hard-play-hard
- You can chase stock options that end up being worth nothing or of low value

[RockHard]

Actually, I want to modify my point #3 - there's a bunch of examples of companies changing the nature of their product along the way. For example, Flickr was spun off of an unsuccessful MMPORG. My basic advice still stands: companies shouldn't be changing direction all the time. There should be consistent leadership and if the focus morphs over time, so be it, as long as it makes sense.

I also don't totally disagree with FuckSong. The system is set up to get the maximum amount of work out of an engineer for the minimum amount of dollars, and unless you're in the door very early, any options you get aren't going to be worth that much comparatively. When my employer went public, my value topped out around $600K but in the end I'll probably pocket about half that. Not bad, but I'm not retiring. But my employer's demands are reasonable too. In almost 8 years, I've pulled one all nighter, when we were cutting over to a new data center and that was planned a month in advance so it wasn't a surprise, and I didn't work the next day. What you have to watch out for is the vampires who want to suck the life out of you and leave you for dead.

[tpiddy]

I've known some people that have had 6 figure and even 7 figure exits and weren't founders but I've known a lot more that toiled away long hours to little or no exit. You shouldn't sacrifice salary with the idea of an exit for sure unless the exit will be huge and you want to gamble.

For me, I have no idea what I would be doing if I wasn't in the tech/info space. I've lived the internet since I was still a pup. We matured at the same rates.

Some startups can have good culture and be fun, others fairly dry and full of nerds, it really depends. Cost of living in tech/info cities is going up fast though and I don't know how a lot of entry level people even maintain. At least some come from privilege and are still gifted money from parents/trusts.

If you can tough it out and distinguish yourself, get to mid-management or above in mature companies, or use experience and connections to start your own thing or join something early, it's probably one of the best career paths right now.

[ColSpanker]

The start-up owner I've been talking with supplies products to industrial accounts, not a whole lot different than the place where I work in the daytime. It's the usual "Gee the outlook is great but don't have a lot of money to pay you with" line. Have heard it all before and my tendency is to walk away from it.
But the day gig I currently have isn't improving and, honestly, I just don't see the $$$$ coming from it. One in the hand, two in the bush situation. The start-up owner and I are talking about working off a draw, something I've never heard anything good about. Or a flat commission, which is where every salesman wants to go, just not in the beginning. Or I could just keep representing the same people I work for now and pick the start-up as a commission-only side-line. The problem with that deal would mean that I would essentially be working 3 jobs: my company, the industrial maintenance sales job and the industrial supplier job.
I might float the balloon about getting stock in the start-up in lieu of front money.

[RockHard]

ColSpanker, that's out of my depth. I've never worked sales and never worked on commission. I guess you could look at equity as deferred commission. How do these sales jobs work as far as time commitment? Would it even be possible to sell on a sideline? My problem as a technologist is that it's really hard for me to be effective on nights & weekends. I'm the type who's most effective in the morning, and managing my time for 2 separate entities that require equal amounts of commitment is just something I haven't been able to figure out. It's really hard for me to serve 2 masters.

I was at a tech meetup in town a couple months ago and for whatever reason 2 aspiring entrepreneurs showed up looking to meet hackers. One was a youngish woman, probably 25 who had some idea she never elaborated on much (entrepreneurs should be paranoid about having their idea stolen, so I'm OK with that). The thing was that she seemed like just another person with a million dollar idea, no real experience, and didn't really bring anything to the table other than an idea. She was pretty disappointed when I told her I wasn't in a position to do equity-only. Basically she's looking for someone to work for free and if she gets a winning lottery ticket, you might get paid.

2nd guy was about 30. He had an idea related to manufacturing that he didn't elaborate much on, but seemed much more on the ball - started one manufacturing company where he took investors and got forced out. Bad situation but the good part is he learned a lesson in his 20s. So he knew the drill as far as knowing he couldn't walk in and ask for some free labor. What I liked about the dude was that he was proud of his past success and willing to talk extensively about that, and he was fired up about his new idea. On top of that, he started talking about another line of business that he thought would be lucrative but he didn't want to do that one - and after talking to this guy about his 2nd best idea, I was fired up to go work on that. So I can't imagine how good his best idea is. I gave him my number hoping he'd get back to me because that's the kind of guy I want to work with - he's got experience and an infectious attitude, so if his idea is any good, he's got a good chance of succeeding.

Here's something I've been wondering though, does anybody approach a startup as an LLP? If you take on partners then they've got skin in the game. I'm sure VCs hate the idea, but if you're into just creating a viable business, an LLP seems like a better way to go about it.

[Handsome Creepy Eel]

Surely Uber and AirBnB are not considered startups? They're huge, stable and well-established corporations.

The term "Startup" generally has a negative connotation to me - the first thing I envision is a group of hipster SJWs working on the next fabulous social network in the hopes of crossing the magical number of users that will allow them to attract a high-powered gambler willing to waste money in a project that never produces any actual revenue.

[Hotwheels]

(12-31-2014 04:05 AM)Handsome Creepy Eel Wrote:  

Surely Uber and AirBnB are not considered startups? They're huge, stable and well-established corporations.

The term "Startup" generally has a negative connotation to me - the first thing I envision is a group of hipster SJWs working on the next fabulous social network in the hopes of crossing the magical number of users that will allow them to attract a high-powered gambler willing to waste money in a project that never produces any actual revenue.

They may not be startups now, but they were just a few short years ago.

Frankly it's amazing the speed a good idea can grow to something huge if it can get the initial traction out of the gate.

[ColSpanker]

RockHard: I've been at a few technology meetings around Philly and encountered the same thing. As a matter of fact, I quite going to the start-up meetings in Philly because it seemed to be full of bright young things with absurd ideas. The guy with the new industrial supply start-up I'm talking with has already had one successful company, but he sold it. He's a lot lower key than most of the start-up people I've dealt with, so this gives me hope.
A lot of the start-up types I've met in Philly seem to be riding on daddy's cash. I couldn't believe how many of them had no business experience whatsoever. The running joke in the hipster Northern Liberties area is that the start-up lasts until the parents get tired of fronting the funds.

[ColSpanker]

Looks like I'm going forward with the industrial supply start-up. Had a number of meetings with the guy and he seems sincere enough. He knows the market well and has good head on his shoulders. What he doesn't have is a lot of money, so we need to discuss the commission level and compensation. I've learned it's best to hash these things out at the beginning, because they will bite you in the ass later if you don't. I'm going to continue repping for the industrial maintenance firm too, probably as a commission only basis. Right now I'm still getting a (sucky) base from them, but have no idea how long that will last as the numbers have fallen through the floor. If they give me a load of shit again, will probably suggest going strictly commission.
The clincher was making a few cold calls with the owner of the start-up today and actually getting warmly received by the prospects. Why was this? BECAUSE WE COULD GET THEM SOMETHING THEY NEED. Amazing how people respond when you have a product they wanat. And this is a specialty item which can't be outsourced. So the potential looks good. For a change.

[RockHard]

(01-09-2015 05:53 PM)ColSpanker Wrote:  

The clincher was making a few cold calls with the owner of the start-up today and actually getting warmly received by the prospects. Why was this? BECAUSE WE COULD GET THEM SOMETHING THEY NEED.

There it is. #1 reason a business will work.

The hard thing as a technologist is that you know computers, and for areas outside that expertise you always look at ideas from an abstract perspective and you have no idea how the business actually works. That's my problem right now, aside from the industry I'm in, I don't have real world experience in a lot of lucrative areas. So I need a partner who knows business but needs technology know-how.

The unsexy industrial supply thing is awesome. I think that all the real money to be made out there is in stuff like this. Gives you an excuse not to tell girls what you do for work, too.

This sounds like a great opportunity, keep us all posted.

[RockHard]

(12-31-2014 04:05 AM)Handsome Creepy Eel Wrote:  

Surely Uber and AirBnB are not considered startups? They're huge, stable and well-established corporations.

The term "Startup" generally has a negative connotation to me - the first thing I envision is a group of hipster SJWs working on the next fabulous social network in the hopes of crossing the magical number of users that will allow them to attract a high-powered gambler willing to waste money in a project that never produces any actual revenue.

They're late stage startups. I'd say they're no longer startups once they go public. Also, it's not clear that either is profitable and both are undergoing huge growth at this point (I hope, if they're not profitable and growth is slowing I don't see how they can IPO).