Why You Should Join a High Growth Startup Like Lime
During my last two years at Babson College and a year after graduation, I worked on building my own company called Shelfie Challenge. It started as something I could work on throughout courses at Babson and I became obsessed with building a product. I learned how to do market research correctly, build pro-forma financial statements, build and present clear pitch decks, forge partnerships with large organizations, and build out extensive business and marketing plans.
The company was beginning to gain some traction near the end of its lifecycle but my health was deteriorating and I needed to take a step back and focus on my health. Stress, 80–100 work weeks, little sleep, and stomach issues required I stop completely. I found out I had an airway obstruction issue that required surgery — septoplasty and turbinate reduction — but the earliest I could schedule the surgery was in August. I ended Shelfie in mid-April.
In April I started spending more time with my friends and family, which was difficult since I was working all day, every day. In May I went home and visited my family and we spent a week in the Dominican Republic — we never take breaks or vacation. At the beginning of June, I started the job search in the Bay Area and targeted Series A+ startups. Companies that sent me offer letters had a little as 20 employees, with some having more than 800.
The biggest priorities for me in choosing a company had to meet the following criteria: incredible teammates, diversity across all spectrums, high growth, a bit of chaos so we can put systems in place, preferably in San Francisco, a challenging role, and the ability to wear multiple hats.
One of the companies I received an offer letter from was Lime. I did a lot of cool things before graduating from college: won 6 national eSports championships, helped my Dad’s company 20x revenue over 3 years, pitched Daymond John and in multiple countries, won the MIT Global Entrepreneurship Bootcamp #5 as the youngest attendee, and was named a Top 100 Social Enabler globally. With that being said, fortunately, Lime didn’t view me as an entry level candidate.
All of my mistakes, successes, and learnings have prepared me to join Lime. I am the regional marketing manager for the northeast. I am from the northeast, lived and went to school there, and have an insanely large network spread out across the northeast. The role seemed perfect.
Now, I want to share with you a few thoughts on why joining a high growth startup is a great idea. It is not for everyone and even if it is not, you will learn more about yourself than you could have imagined.
Learning How to Build a Sustainable Company
One of the biggest challenges of building a startup when you are young is that you most likely have not seen how a company scales to become sustainable and what systems were put in place to support company-wide growth.
If you are thinking about leaving a large company and joined once those systems were already developed and put in place, you are an incredible asset to a high growth startup. You can then come in and put systems in place to help scale growth at the company.
If you are looking to jump-start or transition your career a high growth startup is a dream. You will gain a lot of knowledge that will prove useful to any career you jump into.
If you join a high growth startup early you will be working long hours but learning extensively about building a company, still will have family and friend time, get paid for it if it is VC backed or funded, and you will soon have an executive position as you scale. If you join later, no worries. You can join the management team, become head or director of an apartment, and things move quickly so expect promotions.
Overall tips:
- Make sure you do not get lost in the chaos of high growth companies
- In modern day a lot of high growth companies are losing money but raised a lot of capital to support growth, therefore, understand they are playing the long game
Career Growth
The tip that I always tell people when they join a high growth startup like Lime is that if they work hard, prove their value, and are ambitious towards a promotion, it will happen in a fairly short amount of time.
Large companies with structure have a typical path to promotion. If you join a sales team as a Sales Development Representative you can expect to be there for 9–12 months, then be advanced to a Junior Account Executive for 3–6 months, then a full-scale Account Executive. Then either transition to Account Management, or a director type role at the company.
Overall Tips
- Work hard and smart, be ambitious and you will move closer to a promotion
- Be prepared to help the company with whatever the most pressing needs are, even if it is outside of your direct role
Wearing Multiple Hats
In a high growth startup — HGS for short— your role might say Northeast Marketing Manager, but, you might be in Portland, Oregon one week helping the team out at an event, or working on various national campaigns, or various organizational partnerships.
Even if your company has raised $467m you should expect to complete your roles needs + be willing to help step in and help the company and team where needed. It sounds like a lot of work but this type of collaboration and support goes a long way and truly makes your work more exciting.
Be prepared to rapidly advance your career. Startups are the greatest place for experiential learning on the job and propelling yourself forward.
Overall Tips
- Be ready to thrive in ambiguity and be a self-starter, while knowing your company has the resources to support you when needed
- Having multiple duties might seem stressful when in the process, but completion of a successful projection is one of the most fulfilling feelings you can experience in your career
Stock Options
Startups involve more risk than a traditional company since it is often new, requires systems for scalability, is bootstrapped for cash and resources, and there is still a lot of structure to figure out. Therefore, you are compensated with company stock — also referred to as equity — for your services.
When given stock options expect a 1-year cliff and 36 months of vesting. That means if you are given 10% stock you are granted 2.5% after year 1 and the remaining 7.5% is granted over 36 months on a monthly basis (.2083/month).
After year 1 you have actually accumulated stock. Ideally, you stay with the company for at least 4 years to have all of your stock vested, meaning, granted to you. As you gain promotions in the company you are typically granted more stock.
Startups typically grant stock options for three reasons:
- Retain top talent and keep them at the company
- Compensate for the extra work required, since an acquisition or IPO can give you a large paycheck
- Give you ownership of the company so you are not limited to your hourly wage
Overall Tips
- As a company scales becomes more systematic and works towards a sustainable business model, the level of risk decreases. A Series F startup is a safer bet to last than a Series A
- Expect to be paid a little less than a similar role at a bigger company since the company has to be capital efficient and you are in turn compensated with stock
If you want any tips: brendanbarbato@gmail.com
About the author: Northeast Marketing Manager at Lime, took a small family business from $50k to $1m in revenue in 3 years, have a failed startup under my belt (lot’s of lessons), winner of the MIT Global Entrepreneurship Bootcamp, Babson College ’17 graduate who lived in eTower (houses top 21 entrepreneurs on campus, alumni have raised $500m), partnered my startup with Microsoft while in school, Kairos and Forbes fellow, and played competitive Call of Duty in high school and led my team to six championships.
