Career Transition: From Corporate to Startup
“Are you up for a new challenge?”
I had this conversation with my friends a few years back, when we were still working at one of the Multinational companies in Jakarta. We were looking for a new topic for our podcast, which discusses some stories related to work-life, and this particular topic was quite intriguing.
Now that I’m currently one of the startup employees, I’d like to share my own experience with the readers. I don’t mean to compare which one is better — corporate life or startup because I get positive experiences from both. In my view, deciding which one to choose is just a matter of our personal preferences and career goals.
My Brief Experience
I needed some time to adjust when I was first joining a startup because I get used to a more structural task at my previous corporate jobs and, mind you, I’m a planner and I’d love the prepare everything (even for a long trip, I made a list of what kind of clothes I need to bring and how many!). I’d like to plan my days and I avoid as much as I can any changes close to the deadlines. While at startup… well, there will always be surprises! Your life will never be a dull moment! Fortunately, I got much support from my manager and peers, so I can finally get through it. Yay!
Working Culture
The flat hierarchy will be the first thing that comes to my mind when talking about startups. Sharing your ideas about some necessary improvements is highly encouraged to employees at any level. Sometimes you also need to evaluate certain business processes to make sure it’s already aligned with the industry standard. If you are creative, have an innovative mind, and can work under very minimum supervision, working at a startup could be a great choice.
If you are more of a compliant person and like routine tasks, then a corporation might be more suitable for you. Most business processes are already in place, with certain SOP (Standard Operating Procedure) that needs to be followed. Sometimes, certain guidelines are already given by the company Headquarters. However, it also depends on the department you are in. For example, if you are working in sales, the nature of work will be more dynamic than when you’re working as an accounting associate.
Remember this, everywhere we work, there will always be problems! This is why we’re hired, to solve them and help growing business.
And I heard this a lot that you will work long hours at startups compared to corporate jobs. Well, in my experience, that is not always the case. I’m grateful that I always have managers that encourage their employees to limit their working hours, although sometimes overtime is needed — for example, due to month-end closing since we need to reconcile and finish all reports in a short period. This could happen in any place you work for. For me, this is also mean I need to upgrade my time management skill as well. Try to communicate to the business partners about the possibility to submit the source for your data earlier, so we don’t finish our task overnight.
Learning Curves
You can acquire new knowledge in any place you work for. In my case, I polished my excel skills when I was working as a finance trainee. My seniors were very generous in sharing their excel tips and tricks, while also guiding me on how to make reports and analyses from scratch. I learned about the company’s business process and how to approach the problem in a more structured manner.
At a startup, I get to apply those best practices from my previous corporate jobs, plus getting to know deeper about the whole business process — the interdependency between the decision taken and impact to the business. For example, what is the root cause of the issue on the field, and what are potential risks that could arise if we decide to solve the issue using a certain way. I learn to see problems more holistically.
Learning many things outside of our expertise is being encouraged at startups. In my case here, I learned more about data analytics. I reached out to my tech fellows to help me learned SQL BigQuery and Google Data Studio, so the finance team can build our dashboards, independently.
In both cases, we need to have the motivation to keep learning. If we want to get smarter and build our Career Savings Account (a term that I borrowed from Jon Acuff’s book “Do Over”), we need to push ourselves. Keep your motivation alive!
Career Growth Opportunity
It depends on the company. In the previous companies that I worked for, there were a lot of job opportunities available, even for an international move. All you have to do is applying through the company’s website, then notify your manager and HR that you are interested in that role. If the user who posts the job interested in you, you will get a chance for an interview. If you come from an internal company, it might increase your chance to be accepted in other branches — for example, when you are working at company X in Indonesia and you’re applying for a role at company X in another country. You might also get a chance for an international move at startups. However, I think the higher chance would be if you are working for a Unicorn startup that already has branches in a few countries.
On the condition where you are interested to move outside your department within the same company, my suggestion would be to get in contact as much as possible with the superiors and your peers at your targeted department. Once you do a great job in helping them, the possibility is your name will be on top of their mind to be considered.
One of my friends experienced this once. She was working in finance as a marketing controller. Her actual interest when first joining the company was working in marketing, but there was no vacancy at that time. However she kept doing her best in her current role and after a few years, she told her manager about her career aspirations to move to the marketing team. Her manager supported it and gave her more exposure to the marketing team, up to the director level. She did a great job and became a trusted business partner for the marketing team. Finally, she got promoted to fill in a role as a brand manager.
Maintaining a good relationship with everyone you’ve worked with could open many new opportunities. Who knows? Start building your network now!
Everywhere you work, you will find some of the things that you like or you don’t like. Just embrace them! Difficulties will help us grow, while good things will teach us to be more grateful for what we currently have.
Lastly, your career lies in your hand! Learn more about yourself, find your strengths and weaknesses, and also what you want in life. Define your life value and let it be your guide for whatever you need to choose in life. Keep going and don’t give up!
