Talk to me about Startups

[Deleted]

Have you worked for a Start up company? What was it like? Would you recommend it?

I have been increasingly unhappy with working for large firms because I feel so lost and don't feel like I am making much of a difference or going anywhere. I would love to hear about your experience working for a startup.

[jayandjack]

I don't post here much but I can try and answer.

It really depends on what you do. Startups are tricky. I'm in software development and I've worked for ones where I was the 7th employee, the 50th, and ones where I was the 500th. They tend to pay more because there is a lot more risk working there but you are WAY more out in the open because the team is small. Benefits tend to be not that great, health insurance is generally more expensive and I've rarely encountered ones where they matched 401K. You are always at risk for losing funding or a big client and so layoffs are swift and unexpected. I went from working at one where I was #60 and we hired up till about 175 people and then had a big client cancel their contract and we went down to 40 people, I survived but just barely.

There are a lot of upsides though. There is usually less red tape because you are either creating it or there isn't a need for it yet. You can also have a boss who is more hands off which can be good or bad. I went from working with a micro-manager (at a very big computer company) to one who didn't talk to me for 6 months and I was sure I was going to get fired every day. Turns out he was just really really hands off. I will stress that depending on the size of the company your work is much more in the spotlight though so it's rare to just sit back and not do anything. It's generally a faster paced environment because of that. Also, promotions can be few and far between because it's a small company. They might not have a career path laid out, don't have a need for it, or most likely you will stay at your title for a long time. If they go public you can make money with stock options but if they fold you can lose everything. If they are acquired by another company you can be kept around or let go because they bigger company already has somebody that does your job.

Personally, I like working for smaller companies. I just went from one that was about 4,000 worldwide to my recent one that's about 250.

[Nonny]

My startup experience is all in the software industry. I interned at one in college, had a short contract at one that was setting itself up to be bought out, and I worked on what was essentially a start-up team but under the umbrella of an extremely large company. My H also worked at one shortly after college.

Start ups are HARD. They can be very rewarding, because you build amazing bonds with what will likely be a very small group of co-workers, but part of that camaraderie is often because you are working ridiculous hours. A lot of times you will have flexibility in your daytime hours (for appointments and such) but you might also find yourself at work at 9 pm on a Saturday after having worked 80 hours the past week already.

Resources will probably be scarce as they work towards getting funding (either through venture capital or producing a saleable product), which can be good and bad - it will teach you to become inventive, but you might find yourself using outdated equipment because they can't afford to buy new things. On the flip side, if resources aren't scarce you might find yourself showered in perks (new equipment, food, bonuses) -- word of caution, if your company previously supplied you with a bountiful cabinet of snacks and they start to dwindle without being replace, they are in trouble.

Each startup is going to be different depending on the people who are running it. My intern startup experience was great and a lot of fun. It was a company founded by several very experienced people, and then staffed with college students (and none of us knew what we were doing), and was an amazing learning experience. They started to struggle shortly after I graduated and moved away, and I'm not sure how it all went down, but I know they don't exist anymore.

At my contract job they were angling for a buyout and they did layoffs of full time people as calculated and as kindly as they could, but it still was sad and upsetting. They did get bought out, which I think saved a lot of people's jobs, but then they weren't a startup anymore because they got bought by one of the "big bell" phone companies.

At my not-really-at-startup-but-with-startup-culture job was one part amazing, one part infuriating. We had resources galore, but our project was constantly on the verge of being cut and with the threat of our team being disbanded to other parts of the company. We worked our asses off for 9 months straight (often 6 days a week, never less than 60 hours a week), and we came through with our features intact. We essentially became each others second family, and I've never felt as close to any of my co-workers as I did during that period. However, it was stressful as hell, I didn't get to see my H enough, and I regularly had to bail on planned get togethers with friends. Luckily, these were almost all people in the software industry as well (same company for many of them) and they understood the pressures and didn't hold it against me. It also wrecked my health and made my anxiety so much worse. (I left this job last December and it took several months before the stress nightmares stopped).

My H worked at a startup that was struggling; he was working 80-100+ hours a week and sleeping under his desk at work. Maybe a month before he quit they made everyone come in and work over a 3-day holiday weekend. The next actual business day they divided them up into two groups and fired half the people, and told the people who weren't laid off that those who'd been let go had been given generous severance packages. We were friends with a couple of the people who'd been fired and that was a flat out lie, and there were no severance packages. That was the final straw for my H. He brushed up his resume and started sending it out, intending to hang on until he got something new, but one day he came home and was like, "I'm done, I quit." He then slept for about two weeks straight, and moved on to bigger and better things.

So, if you've made it through my wall of text, I guess my point is, I think they are worth doing once because they give you a new perspective, but I personally wouldn't want to do one again. I place too much value these days on the "life" portion of work/life balance, and I couldn't physically or mentally work in that type of environment now.

[y4m]

I got super lucky and fell into one - I was employee 150 or so and now we are about 1000. This is the biggest company I've been part of now. How "startup" is your startup? Does it have funding? A working product? Revenue?

[Deleted]

Thank you all for your feedback. I did not even think about the uncertainty and risk part of a startup.

sfgal, I am a mechanical engineer and currently in school for a MBA. I am curious about entrepreneurship and thought I could learn a lot from being in a startup. Working as an engineer has trained me to be extremely risk averse, so this would be major change for me.

[Deleted]

I work at an engineering start-up in oil & gas. We were bought out about 2 years ago by another start-up in Asia that has grown much faster. Pay is crap but the bonuses can be significant if you have a good year. You have a lot of potential to be a core employee so there is some job security there, especially when the rest of the industry is struggling. There is a lot less bureaucracy but you deal with the same small group of people every day and if they annoy you, well you are stuck with them. I started here from college and am now in in an international management position, which I probably wouldn't be if I was with a big company. There are pros and cons. I would never get in on the very beginning of one though. It is too much risk and my family needs my paycheck. I think my bosses went like 1-2 years without pay when starting this company.

[Deleted]

Thanks Missy, I am in an oil & gas too, but a large company. I feel so lost and forgotten most of the time, and my job is not fulfilling at all. Plus navigating an extensive good ole boys network is just wearing on me everyday.

[Deleted]

Dec 2, 2015 10:55:42 GMT -5 @porcupine said:

Thanks Missy, I am in an oil & gas too, but a large company. I feel so lost and forgotten most of the time, and my job is not fulfilling at all. Plus navigating an extensive good ole boys network is just wearing on me everyday.

Oh, it's an old boys club industry-wide anyways, sorry to say. We have that here too. Well except for the administrative assistant. She's the side piece of a higher-up so she gets to be a project manager now...in engineering....lol. This is an example of the bs that happens in a small company/start-up and would not likely happen at a large company.

I'm sorry you are struggling with your job right now and hope you can find something better soon!

[Deleted]

Dec 2, 2015 11:12:19 GMT -5 @missy1 said:

Dec 2, 2015 10:55:42 GMT -5 @porcupine said:

Thanks Missy, I am in an oil & gas too, but a large company. I feel so lost and forgotten most of the time, and my job is not fulfilling at all. Plus navigating an extensive good ole boys network is just wearing on me everyday.

Oh, it's an old boys club industry-wide anyways, sorry to say. We have that here too. Well except for the administrative assistant. She's the side piece of a higher-up so she gets to be a project manager now...in engineering....lol. This is an example of the bs that happens in a small company/start-up and would not likely happen at a large company.

I'm sorry you are struggling with your job right now and hope you can find something better soon!

While I am NOT a side piece to a higher up , I am also a project manager for the Engineering dept, despite not having a degree in engineering.  I consider myself very technical and a go-getter though.

I came in a little late, but working at this smallish start up company has been great for me, and I have a lot of benefits from helping to grow the company.

[Deleted]

Dec 2, 2015 11:12:19 GMT -5 @missy1 said:

Dec 2, 2015 10:55:42 GMT -5 @porcupine said:

Thanks Missy, I am in an oil & gas too, but a large company. I feel so lost and forgotten most of the time, and my job is not fulfilling at all. Plus navigating an extensive good ole boys network is just wearing on me everyday.

Oh, it's an old boys club industry-wide anyways, sorry to say. We have that here too. Well except for the administrative assistant. She's the side piece of a higher-up so she gets to be a project manager now...in engineering....lol. This is an example of the bs that happens in a small company/start-up and would not likely happen at a large company.

I'm sorry you are struggling with your job right now and hope you can find something better soon!

Omg, are we working for the same company? We have the same situation in my office.

I am the lonely forgotten female engineer in my office, my goal is to finish business school and get into the business side of things and I thought a startup would be a great place for me to learn and grow, than an old-pale-stale-male corporation that I currently for. 

I also did not realize the amount of hours that you have to put in a start up. Nonny 's experience scares me.

[Deleted]

calamity- I didn't mean to offend you but it sounds like your situation is very different. She is the opposite of go-getter in this case.

@porcupine I am sad to hear this shit happens at big companies too. pm me your location. Maybe we can help each other job search.

[Deleted]

Dec 2, 2015 11:16:41 GMT -5 calamity said:

Dec 2, 2015 11:12:19 GMT -5 @missy1 said:

Oh, it's an old boys club industry-wide anyways, sorry to say. We have that here too. Well except for the administrative assistant. She's the side piece of a higher-up so she gets to be a project manager now...in engineering....lol. This is an example of the bs that happens in a small company/start-up and would not likely happen at a large company.

I'm sorry you are struggling with your job right now and hope you can find something better soon!

While I am NOT a side piece to a higher up , I am also a project manager for the Engineering dept, despite not having a degree in engineering.  I consider myself very technical and a go-getter though.

I came in a little late, but working at this smallish start up company has been great for me, and I have a lot of benefits from helping to grow the company.

The women in our company who do get noticed and promoted act ditzy, simpering, and helpless. It is a culture that has been fostered from upper management.  Our admin, who does not have a college degree, has been promoted to HSE manager because she fits a certain profile. It also stinks because the other guys often pass remarks like "I wonder who she is sleeping with" whenever a woman gets promoted. I am sure you are nothing like this calamity.

[Deleted]

Dec 2, 2015 12:08:32 GMT -5 @porcupine said:

Dec 2, 2015 11:16:41 GMT -5 calamity said:

While I am NOT a side piece to a higher up , I am also a project manager for the Engineering dept, despite not having a degree in engineering.  I consider myself very technical and a go-getter though.

I came in a little late, but working at this smallish start up company has been great for me, and I have a lot of benefits from helping to grow the company.

The women in our company who do get noticed and promoted act ditzy, simpering, and helpless. It is a culture that has been fostered from upper management.  Our admin, who does not have a college degree, has been promoted to HSE manager because she fits a certain profile. It also stinks because the other guys often pass remarks like "I wonder who she is sleeping with" whenever a woman gets promoted. I am sure you are nothing like this calamity .

I know you didn't mean anything bad by it, I think I'm just sensitive since I am the only female in the department and in general I feel I have to work twice as hard to earn respect that most of these guys walk in with on day 1.

A majority of them now call me "boss" because I've earned my stripes if you will.  Plus, I'm in charge of the projects and timelines so it benefits them to treat me kindly  (angel)

[Nonny]

Dec 2, 2015 11:18:16 GMT -5 @porcupine said:

Take the hours related to my experiences with a grain of salt - the software industry is notorious for demanding long hours, and I regularly worked 50-60 hour weeks even when I wasn't at a startup.  

For the internship and the contract job I was hourly, so they were more reasonable with hours.  At the internship I could basically work however many hours I wanted, up to 40 hours per work, but I was also going to school full time, so I think I did about 40 in the summer, and dropped to 20 when I was at school (although there were a couple times I crept up to almost full time, like right before we shipped, and other times I only did 10 or so like right before finals).  At the contract job I was also hourly (and I wasn't exempt) and they didn't want to pay me overtime, so I think I only had to work greater than 40 hours once or twice (again before we shipped something). 

However, at both of those jobs the full time employees definitely worked longer hours, although not as brutal as my H's 80-100+ hour weeks (those people were assholes).  Also, as an intern/contractor I didn't get some of the FT perks, like stock awards or insurance.

But as the start-up/not start-up I was a full time employee, with all the stock, insurance, and bonuses, and it was absolutely an expectation you were there those hours, because you were "support" even if you weren't actually doing anything (although that was rare given how much work we had to do under a firm deadline).  However, we did basically get the entire month of December off after we shipped.  We'd all roll in around 10 am, play games, take 2 hour lunches, play more games, and then leave around 3 or 4.  We had to be there because we were "on call" in case anything went disastrously wrong, but nothing did so they basically just let us do what we wanted to make up for stealing our weekends for the past week. But that was a luxury afforded to us because we worked for a major corporation and not a true startup.