Should you work in a startup for your first job? (For freshers)
I would answer this question in an affirmative.
There is no reason why being a fresher you should say no to such a chance.
Being a fresher, you may receive hell lot of information, guidance, advice, counseling, suggestive lecturing from various quarters. Right from your parents, siblings, friends, mates, teachers, and placements officers (if you had them)–all would give you one thing or other regarding your career and future. The onus however lies on you whether you make the right decision or not. At the same time, to excel in your career, you need to perform on all levels. There is no shortcut to avoid this path.
Our question in the present discussion is a particular one–whether you should choose a startup for your first job or not? To understand the implication of this question, you need to understand the meaning of a startup in a better way.
What’s a startup?
According to Wikipedia definition:
A startup company or startup is a company or temporary organization designed to search for a repeatable and scalable business model. These companies, generally newly created, are in a phase of development and research for markets. The term became popular internationally during the dot-com bubble when a great number of dot-com companies were founded.
Now, you should pick the first-line very attentively. A startup may or may not turn out to be a profitable venture. There is no guarantee that it would do wonders in the market but it a try and search for something that can turn it into a successful business. Before trying to find out the benefits of working in a starup, you should bear in mind these points:
- You might not be able to boast off about the brand name of the company. Nobody in your circle might have heard the name of this organization.
- There might be no formal organizational structure. You may find your boss sitting next to you and doing more work than you can think of.
- There might be no regular working hours or strictly-followed schedule. The timings could be extremely flexible and demanding at the same time.
- There might be no luxury of perks and in-house facilities like game-tables, cafes, gym, etc. The office space itself may be very congested and small. There might not be too much room to stretch your legs.
- You might not be offered a huge amount of salary or incentives.
As a fresher, you actually would want all of these things but startups would not be able to offer you any of them. This turns out to be the real catch for job seekers.
What startups can offer?
If you specifically talk about startups and what lucrative opportunities they offer, below are some points:
- Huge opportunity to learn new skills.
- Testing your working capacity to the hilt.
- Making your a better team player.
- Focusing your objective towards quality of work.
- Making you self-dependent and self-reliant.
- Making you understand the true value of time, money and resources.
- Bringing you closer to the reality of this world.
- And what not…
The list could go endless if we ask people who have worked in a startup at some juncture of their career. I personally have worked in one of them and feel that the year spent with them was well worth. It didn’t simply improved my expertise as an employee, it gave me creative freedom and opportunity to tap my potential peripheral to the core competency that I was hired for.
Working as a placement officer in an engineering college where I have to liaise with corporates and organizations, and at the same time guide the young graduates, I can’t think of a better advice but to hail the entrepreneurial spirit that has picked pace in the whole world and persuade them to join such ventures where they can hone their skills in a way that would pay them in future, all the time.
The pros and cons are accurate. Long hours, variety of work but a whole lot of knowledge and experience gained. Most freshers are keen to learn and there is a lot of self-teaching involved so a start-up would probably suit a resourceful fresher who has an enquiring mind and likes to be accountable. The sort of person who likes to be taught and told what to do may well find a start-up difficult.
Well, I would agree to these points, Janet. A person who is lacking basic skills may find working in a startup difficult.
According to me, Start-ups are not bad idea to start off with. Why not try your luck there, when you are just a fresher in the field, and the corresponding venture is also emerging. When enthusiastic people from both ends meet, it often results in fruitful outcome.
When any new person starts any business he/she may not provide your with much incentives but one thing for sure, he will give you more chances to explore the business world, which any other reputed organization hardly provides. At the same time, it will demand lot of dedication and time to flourish not just as an individual but for that venture too.
I completely agree with the pros and cons of startup mentioned.But in actuality,pros are dominating cons here.
Why a fresher should not go for startup if he/she is finding lot of scope to gain knowledge and experience self-independently.I don’t deny that incentives may be less there but chances to explore in business world will be far better for sure.
So why not go for startups!!!!
Thumbs up from my side!!!!
In my opinion, being a fresher, working with a startup company is a good idea. No doubt, larger corporate jobs might pay more than a startup, but startups provide us a great opportunity to enhance our knowledge and learn new things. Working in a startup, we are able to do a lot of different and innovative things and hence we learn a lot. Here we are given a wonderful opportunity to practicalize our theoretical knowledge. So according to me, to start with a startup company is very good idea and it helps a lot to build a better career.
I think start-ups is a good idea. With this he/she can know how to work with other people in teams on large projects and other non-technical things that just not teach in college, how to deal with managers, other bosses and clients. He/She can also get the knowledge that how the company is an actual business that needs to earn money, how the company hires new hands and what they look for and how they decide how much to pay them.
Every fresher requires to have start-up in their professional life. And start-up doesn’t ever means to earn good salary, name and fame or heights of achievements at once. The basic thing that he/she comes to know is the way to act upon for handling future challenges.
According to me,knowledge is more important than anything else.Start-Up companies are platform where you get to learn not because of money but because you are passionate.Here you get a chance to explore in business world.
Pros and cons are everywhere but I think startups are the best platform to gain knowledge and experience which in turn give you opportunity to achieve higher heights in future.