The 5 Advantages of Working for a Startup Company
Startups are the hype of our recent decade and you might see the statistics that 100 million startups are establishing and investors are investing billions of dollars each year. As a result, this trend is driving innovation around the world.
But also, these startup companies need employees to work for them. For that regard, you may find yourself in a position to decide whether you should work for a startup company or a corporate.
In this article, as a Software Developer who has experienced both types of companies, I want to share my sincere thoughts and opinions about the 5 advantages of working in a startup company. These thoughts of mine can change from company to company because there are many variations of startups and also we cannot regard the chance factor.
1) Gaining Great Experience and Variety of Skills
The biggest advantage of working in a startup company is the experience factor. No matter what happens in that company, they need you to work in various different areas whether it is your profession or not. Because many startups deal with scarce resources and they don’t have the option of spending theirs easily. For that reason I personally found myself while developing websites, hosting them on servers, working on their logo designs without certain task descriptions, even it is not my profession. I was the frontend, backend developer, DevOps, designer, and even the recruiter when they need me. Because there are no other people to do any of that. When you deal with these lots of different positions, inevitably you mature and earn skills that are not possible in corporate companies. But also you need to be an open-minded, easygoing person who is willing to go out of his/her comfort zone in order to earn that experience.
Also, corporate companies can have meaningless working hours which means that you may sit in front of your computer without a task given. But in startups, you can always find another waiting task to do.
In corporates, you can only see the people in your department. Sometime later you can find yourself as living in an aquarium without any knowledge of what other departments are doing. But in startups most likely you will work shoulder by shoulder with every person in your company.
2) Higher Risk Higher Return
Statistically, 90% of startups are failing thus contrary to corporate companies, working for startups comes with a bigger risk of failure which means you can lose your job, get late payments or none. But it also comes with a bigger reward, if your startup company will be successful.
In that case, you may get life-changing shares, bonuses or even a partnership from your company. If none of these rewards were given, there is a chance to find another job position with a promotion in a different company because of your startup experience that is not possibly happening in corporate companies.
In corporate companies, there is much more competition for titles and your hard work might not be noticed because you may not be fairly evaluated or you are not interested in politics. In that case, I can honestly say that most of the startup companies will treat you fairly and evaluate your performance justly. This means you can earn your promotions or titles easier than corporate ones.
3) Working in a Friendly Environment
Most of the startups have a working environment with less than a handful of people. Also, mostly they have overtime work hours. That means you will spend most of your time with your colleagues more than your family and friends. This disadvantage may come with a surprising outcome as a friendly working environment and even a life long friendship.
If you are lucky enough, you may work in an office that you don’t need to put a mask on your face every day, you can be just yourself with your colleagues who will also accept you with your true personality. After a few months, you will joke around without thinking so much and sit on your desk just like you are at home.
But incorporate companies, most of them expect that you need to behave formally and most of the time your colleagues cannot be more than a colleague in your life.
4) Job Satisfaction
If you compare your work in a startup company and a corporate in terms of its output perspective, I can say that in startup companies your daily work has a bigger impact on the product. Because you may be the only frontend or backend developer who is coding every day and without any bureaucracy, you can find yourself your code is being deployed every time you say it is ready. I know it looks a little bit scary and big responsibility but in terms of job satisfaction, it’s priceless.
Also, in startup companies most likely you will involve the project at the beginning phase, thus if you are lucky enough, you will see every phase of the product from requirement gathering and design phase to implementation and its maintenance. Inevitably, these will give you incredible job satisfaction.
If we compare this feeling with working in corporate companies, you will take part in a very small thing of something huge. Most of the time, you have trouble seeing the bigger picture and even you have finished your given task, it can take weeks to see it’s deployed because of the bureaucracy. That’s why I believe, it will decrease your job satisfaction.
5) Perks
Of course, corporate companies can have many more perks in terms of private health insurance and retirement pension. But if you look at the bright side of the startups, most likely you will have flexible work hours, no dress code, remote work opportunities, no superiors-subordinates relationship. Also, your boss or colleagues will not complain about how much time you sit on your chair instead they will be interested in how much output you give.
Another perk of the startups is the communication factor. You can communicate with face to face talks easily or worse you can use slack channels but in corporate companies, most of them are expecting formal emails for that.
Conclusion
I hope by reading this article you have some opinions about what it’s like to work in startups. Again I want to say that my opinions are not certain rules but it may help you if you are never worked in a startup before.
If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact me.
See you in new articles.
