Startups vs Tech Giants. Where to start?
Looking at the trend of being at the top notch companies has now become a vogue, and this paranoia exists majorly in the mind of fresher/recent graduates. I do agree with the fact that the big tech giants has certain privileges, which the small scale companies cannot give right now. But if I were to give suggestions to the recent graduates/freshers from where should they start, I would really recommend startups. To support my point, I have something for you, so please follow these pointers, and then ask the question again, “Is it really the FAANG, TAANG etc always, or the right start up?” :
➼ The reality is, the tech giants like FAANG, was once a startup. If everybody would have preferred the same mentality like today’s world, joining only top notch companies, FAANG, TAANG etc would have stopped after some time. The best recent example I could give you right now is Tesla-PayPal, Elon Musk had started PayPal and Tesla, a company once nobody gave a crap about joining, but the people who stayed there with Musk, a place which in layman terms the recent graduates calls, “Nah! not so interesting, and famous”, are the ones, who are the achievers in this very field.
➼ The freedom you get to learn something new, expand your mind, and experiment is huge in startups. And that is how you learn and grow, and become great at it. Tech giants cannot have that, cos of the larger team, and they are already expanded, so chances of experimenting on new things minimizes (I am comparing the scenario, and that is the truth)
➼ Apart from your work, you can explore new teams, and work with them in startups, the chances of becoming an all rounder personality is exponential here.
➼ It is always a great feeling to become a part of the product/core team which will be changing/impacting thousands of life in future. You will cherish these things while looking back into your life, and see how life changing product you have created with the team which was once just a bunch of employees. You will have the opportunity to say that, yes, you were a part of a legacy product which is now changing thousands of lives. The chances of saying that right now would not be as great as the one in the startups.
➼ Startups makes you tough in different ways, which will save your life in the upcoming roads which you will be taking in the future, as you grow in your respective careers. There will be a time, when you will ask questions to yourselves, “Am I in the right place, do I know anything about what I want to do right now?”, but I can assure you, if you can survive that, nobody will ever be able to push you down, cos you will be invincible, and your graph will always go up, like this one.
➼ It is 100% true, that the amount of time you take to learn a new thing by working in startups is way greater than the tech giants. And it is a proven fact, even the people who are working in the tech giants will agree on that.
➼ The most important part, the learnings. This part is a life changing part. The secret to success is — How fast you can learn something, and be comfortable at it. In this tough competitive market, it is almost impossible to stay behind, cos the way the technologies are evolving, you cannot afford to stay behind. You need to update yourself by the time you see a new tech arrives into the market. Let me break it down for you, in the next section.
Learnings, it is something very important, and how do we say that a start up gives us more learning? Now let us first understand, how you can survive into the market.
➼ As said earlier, the lesser the better. What I meant is, the less time you take to learn something, and become comfortable at it, will always make you stay ahead in the curve. Hence, more confidence, which is directly proportional to more growth.
➼ The ability to decide which technology is better for your use case, and which is not is the ability which every body wants to learn, but only few have it. Cos, this is something which has to be imparted when you start your journey in your respective field, and if you look at the scenario, startups has got this for you.
You are the part of the small team, in which you will be made to think like that, to decide, and your decision will also decide the future of the product, which is again proportional to the success of the company.
And that is how a future leader is moulded, who can take up the responsibility, and become someone, to whom every body can look up-to. Getting these privileges in the Tech Giants is not as much as startups.
You might be thinking, that’s okay even if some points are valid, but what should I do? How should I move my step forward? There are a lot of companies, which are not good too, so I am afraid, if I will land up in a place where my career is taking a wrong turn, then what?
The above questions are normal yet very important, and everybody should think before starting their career (for freshers), or while making choices for a switch (for experience professionals). I will be now giving you the answers to the above questions, so that it can help you take the right decision, or make you good enough to decide something better for your career. So let’s start, shall we?
A What should I do? First of all, if you have come this far, then something made sense to you, and I thank you for that. So without further a do, let us start. There are fair point of places where you can find different jobs in the various start ups. Now, my personal favorite is AngelList. AngelList is world’s largest start up community, and is helping thousand of candidates to start their journey in one of the greatest startups present anywhere in the world. Not to forget, AngelList helped me land into one of the startups in Bengaluru. Never regretted my choice, and now I am here sharing some insights with all of you! There are other places as well, but AngelList is something great in respect of finding great startups to work in.
B How should I move my step forward? Another great question. Now that you know where to find the jobs, you can check out various interested positions in different companies (Assuming, you are already done with your interested profile decision). Try reading about what they want from a candidate, and also, what are they offering you as a company to learn and grow. Some companies, gives out various assignments for the same. So check those out as well. Make sure to check for these things as well:
➡ How many people you will be working with?
➡ What are they offering, in respect of facilities?
➡ What will be the team size in which you will be working, and so on and so forth
➡ Reviews about the company on websites like Glassdoor, or simply google search about the same
➡ Is the location fine for you?
➡ Work From Home facility (For Pandemic Only)
➡ What machine they are offering to perform your job (Very Important)
➡ What is the week-off schedule for you? Are you getting enough breaks for you to be mind fit too.
C There are a lot of companies, which are not good too, so I am afraid, if I will land up in a place where my career is taking a wrong turn, then what? Some of the answer to this particular query has already been clarified in point number B, now adding some more pointers to that. For finding this one out, whether you might take the wrong turn in your career:
➡ You should always be ready with all the desired work list which you want to perform in the company. For example you want to become a Full Stack Developer, and want to work on various stacks (which is demanding) on both the ends.
➡ Does the company uses latest techs to work/build products, or using obsolete techs like PHP to build some of their products (Very Important)
➡ How does the company helps you take decision, and are you allowed to make decision based upon the demand it has in the current market?
In most of the cases, companies calls you and gives you some challenge to complete, be it coding challenge or some of your work related challenge to complete. In that case, see these:
➡ How much they are offering to give you for completion
➡ What is their expectations level, are they asking too much as per the timeline?
➡ Are they asking you to just submit your project, and don’t give a GitHub like for the same? (This case, they are just using you to complete one project, and then they will just use your full code, and go away, if they don’t want you, so beware)
Now that we have talked a lot about every thing, but you might have one question, that, hey! we did not even talk about Money part. This is important too… I know it is important, and you should be having some expectations as well, but there is one thing which I wanted to tell you and that is
Startups are a small scale companies, and if you find a good start up, your life will be made! It will offer you way more than your expectations, when it comes to learning and growing part. Now with all being said, if the company offers you a lesser package then your expectations, then see what is the margin level, and try understanding one thing, it is totally fine to start with a lesser salary, and with the learnings you will get, you will definitely reach to a bigger salary.
With that being said, the optimum salary which I think which will be enough for a fresher Software Engineer would be 3.6–4LPA for a start up. I think it is a good deal, when it comes to learnings and earnings! :D
Do not ever compare yourself with other people, there will always be people who are above you, and who are below you, so don’t compare. Just focus on one thing, is it really worth it! Become the best version of yourself, and conquer the world!
I think, if you follow the above pointers, it is really difficult that you will be falling into a dark pit, which will hamper your career growth as a fresher in the industry. But if you think you have any other apprehensions regarding working in the start up, let me know in the comment. Happy to help!
