Five Big Reasons Why Grads Choose to Work in Startups After College.

I got my first job about a month after graduating and, purely by chance, it happened to be in a startup. Now, I have to admit: I didn’t really have a Scooby Doo (clue) what a startup actually was at the time.

Six years on, I’m still working in a startup, albeit in a different sector, and I really couldn’t imagine working in any other kind of professional setting now.

When you come out of college, you’re clutching your hard-earned degree in one arm and a stack of duplicates of your CV/résumé in the other, ready to take on the world. But the truth is that you’re probably not really ready for the ‘adventure’ that lies ahead.

Very soon after picking up your second master’s degree (the one you took on in an attempt to stay in school for as long as possible), you quickly discover the true cost of former guilty pleasures — like eating takeway pizza for dinner on a regular basis — when you suddenly have to pay for it with your own hard-earned bucks. In other words, shit gets very real, very fast.

In my humble opinion, working for a startup is the perfect transitional bridge between college and the world of work. In this post, I’ll try to break it down like a quadratic equation and show you five special ingredients that go into the ‘startup sauce’ that make it such a tasty environment in which to work.

Hopefully, by the end, it’ll have whetted your appetite for the world of tech startups and got you thinking about the kind of exciting job opportunities it presents.

Sitting comfortably?

1. Working for a startup can be a little easier on your wallet…

Working in a startup is like the perfect harmony because: (a) you have a job and (b) your job allows you to cut down on a few cheeky costs that can add up to one big bill.

For example, many startups offer their employees food related perks, such as free lunches, breakfast when you stumble in in the morning, or discounts with local gastrophilic businesses.

The fridges at startup kitchens are also usually stocked and stacked to the heavens with snacks and drinks, and there’s normally caffeine on tap too. It’s a land of milk and honey (and two sugars, please).

Here at Tyba, we’re fortunate enough to have most of the above. On Fridays, we don’t have to worry about the regular conundrum of what we’re going to shovel into our faces for lunch; we simply count down the minutes until 2pm (lunchtime here), muffling our belly groans until the sound of the delivery guy’s footsteps in the hallway announces the arrival of sushi, Thai food, or whatever flavoursome fare we’ve ordered that week.

We always eat together too, which is great for team building.

2. Startups often have mutual back-scratching arrangements…

The startup community can be a bit like a brother- or sisterhood at times; we like to help each other out when we can.

So sometimes startups will offer perks to other startups just because they’re in ‘the network’. Tyba team members, for example, have benefitted from discounts on services like cheaper rides from MyTaxi, or a discount on domestic services like Helpling — both of which are companies on Tyba.

On our trail of Europe’s coolest companies, we’ve stumbled across a number of startup outfits making über-cool products that we would love to get our greasy mitts on one day.

3. Your parents will be impressed and sleep better at night…

One of (perhaps) the most common perks of working in a startup is also one that will get your parents to give you a break: health insurance.

A lot of startups offer their team a benefits package that comes with health, vision and dental care. This is most likely an issue that sat on the back burner for so long while you were at college, but suddenly became necessary when you graduated and promptly discovered that mom and dad’s insurance no longer covers your risk-taking ass.

Some startups take this generous offering even further by offering a helping hand towards commuting costs, special deals for gym lovers, and rideshare schemes for city cyclists (though this may depend on the city).

The likelihood is that your mom and dad were never offered any of this kind of company swag when they first started working, so they’ll be super impressed to discover your employer actually provides these things, if indeed that turns out to be the case.

4. Your startup will always have your back…

When I joined Tyba, it involved moving my whole life from London to Madrid.

I had no idea where to even begin; long-term relocation is something I’ve never done before. But, to my great surprise and gratitude, Tyba totally had my back on this.

From the journey over to Spain, to my temporary resting place for the first week, and even my current apartment, Tyba made sure that I landed on my feet, so that I could focus on being the best I possibly can at my job. After all, that’s why I’m here in the first place, right?

Trust me, this kind of backing is very important when you switch countries for work — especially if you’ve never done it before. But that’s just how a startup rolls.

4. Your startup is likely to ‘stock you up’…

This one can depend a little on when you join (and where), but one of the top perks people mention concerning working in a startup is that, often, they’ll offer you a piece of the company pie when you join. All the other perks are like the custard dribbled on top — the pièce de résistance, if you will.

Every company handles the dishing-out of stock options differently, but if you swot up on how it all works, or ask the right questions, they could make you a very happy bunny one day.

At Tyba, team members are offered some quite flexible stock options upon joining, which is fantastic. But above and beyond the obvious financial gains to be had from said stock options, the real pay-off comes from the feeling of having some ownership of the company you work for.

It puts that extra bit of spring in your step and wind in your sails every morning as you make your way to the office.

As you can see, startups are about more than just a job; they are about everything that comes with it — the whole shebang. And, as I said earlier, I couldn’t imagine switching back to a more traditional professional lifestyle at this point in my career.

So if you’ve just graduated (or are about to) and are weighing up your options for the next steps, I would very highly recommend the startup path — though you should always lean towards finding a job that excites you. The best thing is: startups are always hiring!

You can read the original version of this post at its birthplace, the Tyba Blog, if you fancy it. You’ll also find some other words that I’ve left there.