10 ms·

Why Non-engineers Think Engineers Are Better Off Joining Startups

181 points by diego 16y ago

mgkimsal 16y ago
"and then build a crappy, I-hope-nobody-sees-this-code prototype." And it'll end up being 'production' code because "we already have it and they already paid for it!". And the crappier it is, the longer it will remain in production and the harder everyone will fight against rebuilding it to be not crappy.
- preek 16y ago
  That's why I quit my job at a big corporation (not a classic IT behemoth, though) and will start working at a startup in two weeks. The code there sucked - and most coders did, too.
  - j_baker 16y ago
    I hope you aren't expecting startup code to be a lot better. Not only will startup code tend to be crappy, but you run into a ton of people (managers and coders alike) who will all but insist that your code be a certain level of crappy. In other words, if you write good code, then you've spent too much time on it and should have moved on to the next project. I don't mean to give you the impression that your new job is going to suck. If you chose the right startup, you're going to have an awesome time. But I also think it's important to be realistic.
    - danenania 16y ago
      Is this such a bad thing? Engineers often have a tendency to to focus too much on writing 'good code', and forget the bigger picture of what they're working on. Technical debt is a real issue, but it's something to manage, not eliminate. I'd much rather be in a place where most engineers have at least half a pragmatic eye on products, features, and ux rather than only caring about code quality and the elegance of their algorithms. Yeah, it can also be good to have a few of those code quality sticklers around to keep everyone honest, but they shouldn't be running things or setting the tone. I think a big part of the reason a management tier is needed at all in a lot of smaller companies is the general unwillingness of engineers to sacrifice code purity for expediency.
      - j_baker 16y ago
        And I think the need for engineers in smaller companies is the unwillingness of management to sacrifice expediency for purity. :-) Regardless, that's beside my point. It sounded like the person I responded to wanted to work on better code, so I was just pointing out that startups aren't necessarily any better in that respect. I'll leave it to him to determine how good or bad that is as I'd really rather not get involved in this old debate again.
    - cicero 16y ago
      When I went from a big company to a startup, I saw a significant increase in engineering talent. There were some good people at the big company, but there was also a lot of dead weight. It was easy to just coast through a project there. At the startup, you had to be sharp, or you were out. I won't say the code was always pretty at the startup, but due to the higher level of skill among the developers, I think the code there was superior to what was produced at the big company. Although the startup went under after I was there 2 years, I learned 10 times the stuff in 2 years of the startup than I did the previous 5 years at the big company. The skills I learned at the startup allowed me to get into a much better job at another big company that I stayed at for 11 years.
      - j_baker 16y ago
        That's the position I'm in right now. I'm not saying there aren't startups with good code out there. I'm just trying to say that it's not startup_code == good && bigco_code == bad
    - Devilboy 16y ago
      At a startup the code will still be bad but there won't be anyone to blame.
- rmc00 16y ago
  Very true. I recently inherited an application at work that has a dark corner where a past co-worker wrote a crappy, I-hope-nobody-sees-this-code prototype. While the code does produce correct results, it's very messy. Most of the people who really understood how it works have left over the years since it was built too. I've been trying to understand exactly how the application works, and it's way more effort than it should be. The point is this: build your software right. At the very least, only take reasonable shortcuts, and make sure you come back around to fix your crappy design at some point. The longer it festers, the worse it will get.
jswiente 16y ago
"You will have stability. If you are hired by Oracle or Google [...] chances are you'll be able to work on this specific problem for long enough to accomplish something." Large companies change all the time. Departments are merged, strategies are changed and projects are stopped constantly. I think this point isn't valid.
- pestaa 16y ago
  Engineers aren't fired just because a project is cancelled. Generally speaking jobs are safer than startups. I agree the point isn't valid, though, but I think yours isn't, either.
  - bufordtwain 16y ago
    It depends on the financial stability of the company in question. If the company, large or small, isn't making a healthy profit, your job is at risk.
    - j_baker 16y ago
      Chances are better that the large company is making a healthy profit though. To be sure, this is not true all the time (look at yahoo). However, I think it's fair to say that in general, your job is more secure at a big company than it will be at a small company.
  - jswiente 16y ago
    Sure, but job safety is another issue. The argument in question was that you have a more stable environment in a large company regarding the topics you are working on. In my opinion, this isn't the case. Think of the engineers working on Google Wave or discontinued Sun technologies.
    - j_baker 16y ago
      The argument was that you would probably work on something "long enough to accomplish something", and that's true. I mean, the Google Wave team did accomplish something. That isn't always true at a startup. Many times, you get hired to work on something that you never complete because you're constantly diverted to go put out fires elsewhere.
pestaa 16y ago
The sad thing is, most engineers are constantly in information-gathering mode, putting them in the front of the hype. Any logical being would play with the idea of financial freedom. And it is unlikely in a "regular job."
- baq 16y ago
  Any logical being would play with the idea of financial freedom. And it is unlikely in a "regular job." Not like it's likely in a startup.
  - pestaa 16y ago
    Anything greater than zero is more likely in my book. Most startups can't be automated, though, so are all the jobs. An automated startup equals freedom though.
- yannickt 16y ago
  It is no more likely in a non-regular job. In fact, it might be even less likely.
wallflower 16y ago
We've done polls here on HN before of where people work. A significant percentage of the HN community work for companies that are not startups. Sometimes even just reading on HN about people who are succeeding (or persisting) with their side projects or about successful startup founders or failed startup founders is enough to release the tension (momentarily) - to jump from a certain 9 to 5 reality to very real world of a real start-up. The ability to leave your job at 5pm is very much a benefit, one that 99% of startups will never offer. That being said, you will never become wealthy[1] without ownership of something that produces income. That will almost never happen at a BigCo. My mom had multiple patents - for which she got a nice lucite paperweight [2] [1] My definition of wealthy == How long you can maintain your current, preferred lifestyle without working. This means building a semi-passive/semi-active income from your own products. Binging on consulting income isn't the same. Yes, you can adjust your preferred lifestyle to meet median cash flows. [2] Example from the "Corporate & IP Recognition Company" (LOL) http://aztecawards.com/clear-lucite-silver-plate-sq12.html http://aztecawards.com/clear-lucite-silver-plate-sq12.html
- j_baker 16y ago
  > The ability to leave your job at 5pm is very much a benefit, one that 99% of startups will never offer. And one can also argue that 99% of startups aren't worth working for. It's incredible how many startups are out there that are doing things wrong. The most important part of working for a startup is choosing the right one (ie, one that won't confuse productivity and butt in seat time).
  - quickpost 16y ago
    > The most important part of working for a startup is choosing the right one... Ya I couldn't agree more... It's one topic that I would like to see covered more often is how to identify the right startup from a prospective employee perspective.
    - j_baker 16y ago
      There's a problem with that though. I think one could write a ton about choosing a startup that will be successful from a strictly economic standpoint. But I can't write anything to tell you what kind of startup you want to work for. That's something you're pretty much on your own with. As Carl Jung once said: "The secret to your vision lies in your own heart. Who looks outside dreams; who looks inside awakens."
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
samt 16y ago
Good times are better for working at startups for one reason - switching costs are lower. When you know that if $employer runs out of cash but you can find another job in a week, there's very little risk involved as a startup engineer. That said, as an engineer being a startup "employee" is a sucker's game. You'll never get enough equity or intangibles to compensate for the risk/effort/opportunity cost.
- flacon 16y ago
  "That said, as an engineer being a startup "employee" is a sucker's game. You'll never get enough equity or intangibles to compensate for the risk/effort/opportunity cost." As someone that just left a startup I couldn't agree more...
  - samt 16y ago
    So what's your plan now? :)
    - angstrom 16y ago
      I would sell the equity and invest it in a six pack of socks. Honestly, I think anyone working for a startup should continually re-evaluate their commitment to the vision every 3-4 months. If it pains you to see where things are going you're better off cutting lose. I've seen people waste 4 years at a startup only to leave empty handed. It can be very much like a gambler's dilemma. The more time/money you invest the harder it becomes to walk away. Eventually they realize they've stayed not because they agree with the vision, but because they don't want to cut their losses. One such startup I know of is going 10 years strong. I think the VCs are in the same situation as the former coworker I mentioned; throwing good money after bad.
      - fookyong 16y ago
        wow. I want to upvote this 100 times - you basically describe my exact situation. I'm leaving a startup next month. I'm in a senior position so it was a very difficult decision to make in addition to what you said about the time invested / gambler's dilemma. But in the end, like you said, I just don't agree with the direction the company is going - whilst at the same time I have no doubt that the company will continue to successfully raise VC, for the exact reasons you describe. In a nutshell, get out of my mind, sir!
lylanm 16y ago
"it would never cross my mind to make a blanket statement that all engineers should work at startups" --> I completely agree. In fact, such blanket statements about almost any kind of advice is often naive.
- arvinds 16y ago
  I think it is more to make a point: http://www.paulgraham.com/discover.html http://www.paulgraham.com/discover.html
ashr 16y ago
I have no idea if there is a specific non-engineer that this post is talking about. The author of the referenced techcrunch article Bindu Reddy is certainly not a non-engineer : http://www.crunchbase.com/person/bindu-reddy http://www.crunchbase.com/person/bindu-reddy It also seems to me that this post is criticizing two sentences out of the entire article (http://techcrunch.com/2011/02/13/engineers-startups/ http://techcrunch.com/2011/02/13/engineers-startups/) without properly understanding them with rest of the context. All this article is saying is that due to the market warming up, now is a good time for engineers to work at a start up. That said, I agree with the point that dbasch is trying to make even though I don't think that they needed to be presented as a 'rebuttal'.
- jshen 16y ago
  All this article is saying is that due to the market warming up, now is a good time for engineers to work at a large company. Both of these are true, so the real fact is that now is a good time to be an engineeer.
- ctide 16y ago
  That crunchbase link says nothing about engineering, only product management. Am I missing something there?
- bindupreddy 16y ago
  Just for the record. I am an engineer. I worked at Elance for a couple of yrs in engineering. I also happened to write most of the front-end code for MyLikes in 2008/2009
jeanhsu 16y ago
Totally agree with a lot of the points you brought up. There are pluses to working at large companies, and many people are happy there. I left Google to work for myself and then joined a startup, and couldn't be happier. Wrote a response as well and included your post: http://www.jeanhsu.com/?p=247 http://www.jeanhsu.com/?p=247
- earthaid 16y ago
  I think Jean's post helpfully encapsulates the value of this discussion: that engineers (and non-engineers!) should certainly consider startups in general as an employment, educational, and financial experience that at a base level (say, in the context of a well-funded startup) will probably at least rival work in a larger corporate setting. But, as lylanm also points out below, perhaps the larger point is that there's not much merit in comparing the prospect of work at an abstract startup versus the prospect of work at an abstract large corporation --- especially if you don't have an offer from either. Whether you're looking for a first job or just a new job, it's certainly worth exploring whether a particular startup might be a better fun+financial+whatever fit for you than another opportunity that's been extended to you at a particular established company.
zeemonkee 16y ago
The argument seems to be BigCorp vs. startup. You can also work in a relatively sane, small-to medium sized stable business.
- mryall 16y ago
  In terms of the points cited in the article, there's not that much difference between BigCorp and a SME. Both would pay similar salaries and have stable long-term roles for engineers, which I think were the author's points.
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hackerbysea 16y ago
I have to say I'm a bit surprised by the sentiment favoring working at big companies among the majority of comments here. One possible explanation: 1) Statistically, most engineers work for big companies. 2) By human nature, people tend to stick to their current jobs, most likely a big company job. Here is a related thread at Quora: http://www.quora.com/If-I-want-to-be-an-entrepreneur-later-should-I-now-work-for-a-large-company-or-a-startup http://www.quora.com/If-I-want-to-be-an-entrepreneur-later-s...
sanj 16y ago
The "why" question wasn't answered in the actual article. It was a reasonable debunking of a deplorable TC article, but I was really interested in the difference in mindset.

181 points by diego 16y ago

"and then build a crappy, I-hope-nobody-sees-this-code prototype." And it'll end up being 'production' code because "we already have it and they already paid for it!". And the crappier it is, the longer it will remain in production and the harder everyone will fight against rebuilding it to be not crappy.

preek 16y ago
That's why I quit my job at a big corporation (not a classic IT behemoth, though) and will start working at a startup in two weeks. The code there sucked - and most coders did, too.
- j_baker 16y ago
  I hope you aren't expecting startup code to be a lot better. Not only will startup code tend to be crappy, but you run into a ton of people (managers and coders alike) who will all but insist that your code be a certain level of crappy. In other words, if you write good code, then you've spent too much time on it and should have moved on to the next project. I don't mean to give you the impression that your new job is going to suck. If you chose the right startup, you're going to have an awesome time. But I also think it's important to be realistic.
  - danenania 16y ago
    Is this such a bad thing? Engineers often have a tendency to to focus too much on writing 'good code', and forget the bigger picture of what they're working on. Technical debt is a real issue, but it's something to manage, not eliminate. I'd much rather be in a place where most engineers have at least half a pragmatic eye on products, features, and ux rather than only caring about code quality and the elegance of their algorithms. Yeah, it can also be good to have a few of those code quality sticklers around to keep everyone honest, but they shouldn't be running things or setting the tone. I think a big part of the reason a management tier is needed at all in a lot of smaller companies is the general unwillingness of engineers to sacrifice code purity for expediency.
    - j_baker 16y ago
      And I think the need for engineers in smaller companies is the unwillingness of management to sacrifice expediency for purity. :-) Regardless, that's beside my point. It sounded like the person I responded to wanted to work on better code, so I was just pointing out that startups aren't necessarily any better in that respect. I'll leave it to him to determine how good or bad that is as I'd really rather not get involved in this old debate again.
  - cicero 16y ago
    When I went from a big company to a startup, I saw a significant increase in engineering talent. There were some good people at the big company, but there was also a lot of dead weight. It was easy to just coast through a project there. At the startup, you had to be sharp, or you were out. I won't say the code was always pretty at the startup, but due to the higher level of skill among the developers, I think the code there was superior to what was produced at the big company. Although the startup went under after I was there 2 years, I learned 10 times the stuff in 2 years of the startup than I did the previous 5 years at the big company. The skills I learned at the startup allowed me to get into a much better job at another big company that I stayed at for 11 years.
    - j_baker 16y ago
      That's the position I'm in right now. I'm not saying there aren't startups with good code out there. I'm just trying to say that it's not startup_code == good && bigco_code == bad
  - Devilboy 16y ago
    At a startup the code will still be bad but there won't be anyone to blame.
rmc00 16y ago
Very true. I recently inherited an application at work that has a dark corner where a past co-worker wrote a crappy, I-hope-nobody-sees-this-code prototype. While the code does produce correct results, it's very messy. Most of the people who really understood how it works have left over the years since it was built too. I've been trying to understand exactly how the application works, and it's way more effort than it should be. The point is this: build your software right. At the very least, only take reasonable shortcuts, and make sure you come back around to fix your crappy design at some point. The longer it festers, the worse it will get.

jswiente 16y ago

"You will have stability. If you are hired by Oracle or Google [...] chances are you'll be able to work on this specific problem for long enough to accomplish something." Large companies change all the time. Departments are merged, strategies are changed and projects are stopped constantly. I think this point isn't valid.

pestaa 16y ago
Engineers aren't fired just because a project is cancelled. Generally speaking jobs are safer than startups. I agree the point isn't valid, though, but I think yours isn't, either.
- bufordtwain 16y ago
  It depends on the financial stability of the company in question. If the company, large or small, isn't making a healthy profit, your job is at risk.
  - j_baker 16y ago
    Chances are better that the large company is making a healthy profit though. To be sure, this is not true all the time (look at yahoo). However, I think it's fair to say that in general, your job is more secure at a big company than it will be at a small company.
- jswiente 16y ago
  Sure, but job safety is another issue. The argument in question was that you have a more stable environment in a large company regarding the topics you are working on. In my opinion, this isn't the case. Think of the engineers working on Google Wave or discontinued Sun technologies.
  - j_baker 16y ago
    The argument was that you would probably work on something "long enough to accomplish something", and that's true. I mean, the Google Wave team did accomplish something. That isn't always true at a startup. Many times, you get hired to work on something that you never complete because you're constantly diverted to go put out fires elsewhere.

pestaa 16y ago

The sad thing is, most engineers are constantly in information-gathering mode, putting them in the front of the hype. Any logical being would play with the idea of financial freedom. And it is unlikely in a "regular job."

baq 16y ago
Any logical being would play with the idea of financial freedom. And it is unlikely in a "regular job." Not like it's likely in a startup.
- pestaa 16y ago
  Anything greater than zero is more likely in my book. Most startups can't be automated, though, so are all the jobs. An automated startup equals freedom though.
yannickt 16y ago
It is no more likely in a non-regular job. In fact, it might be even less likely.

wallflower 16y ago

We've done polls here on HN before of where people work. A significant percentage of the HN community work for companies that are not startups. Sometimes even just reading on HN about people who are succeeding (or persisting) with their side projects or about successful startup founders or failed startup founders is enough to release the tension (momentarily) - to jump from a certain 9 to 5 reality to very real world of a real start-up. The ability to leave your job at 5pm is very much a benefit, one that 99% of startups will never offer. That being said, you will never become wealthy[1] without ownership of something that produces income. That will almost never happen at a BigCo. My mom had multiple patents - for which she got a nice lucite paperweight [2] [1] My definition of wealthy == How long you can maintain your current, preferred lifestyle without working. This means building a semi-passive/semi-active income from your own products. Binging on consulting income isn't the same. Yes, you can adjust your preferred lifestyle to meet median cash flows. [2] Example from the "Corporate & IP Recognition Company" (LOL) http://aztecawards.com/clear-lucite-silver-plate-sq12.html http://aztecawards.com/clear-lucite-silver-plate-sq12.html

j_baker 16y ago
> The ability to leave your job at 5pm is very much a benefit, one that 99% of startups will never offer. And one can also argue that 99% of startups aren't worth working for. It's incredible how many startups are out there that are doing things wrong. The most important part of working for a startup is choosing the right one (ie, one that won't confuse productivity and butt in seat time).
- quickpost 16y ago
  > The most important part of working for a startup is choosing the right one... Ya I couldn't agree more... It's one topic that I would like to see covered more often is how to identify the right startup from a prospective employee perspective.
  - j_baker 16y ago
    There's a problem with that though. I think one could write a ton about choosing a startup that will be successful from a strictly economic standpoint. But I can't write anything to tell you what kind of startup you want to work for. That's something you're pretty much on your own with. As Carl Jung once said: "The secret to your vision lies in your own heart. Who looks outside dreams; who looks inside awakens."

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

samt 16y ago

Good times are better for working at startups for one reason - switching costs are lower. When you know that if $employer runs out of cash but you can find another job in a week, there's very little risk involved as a startup engineer. That said, as an engineer being a startup "employee" is a sucker's game. You'll never get enough equity or intangibles to compensate for the risk/effort/opportunity cost.

flacon 16y ago
"That said, as an engineer being a startup "employee" is a sucker's game. You'll never get enough equity or intangibles to compensate for the risk/effort/opportunity cost." As someone that just left a startup I couldn't agree more...
- samt 16y ago
  So what's your plan now? :)
  - angstrom 16y ago
    I would sell the equity and invest it in a six pack of socks. Honestly, I think anyone working for a startup should continually re-evaluate their commitment to the vision every 3-4 months. If it pains you to see where things are going you're better off cutting lose. I've seen people waste 4 years at a startup only to leave empty handed. It can be very much like a gambler's dilemma. The more time/money you invest the harder it becomes to walk away. Eventually they realize they've stayed not because they agree with the vision, but because they don't want to cut their losses. One such startup I know of is going 10 years strong. I think the VCs are in the same situation as the former coworker I mentioned; throwing good money after bad.
    - fookyong 16y ago
      wow. I want to upvote this 100 times - you basically describe my exact situation. I'm leaving a startup next month. I'm in a senior position so it was a very difficult decision to make in addition to what you said about the time invested / gambler's dilemma. But in the end, like you said, I just don't agree with the direction the company is going - whilst at the same time I have no doubt that the company will continue to successfully raise VC, for the exact reasons you describe. In a nutshell, get out of my mind, sir!

lylanm 16y ago

"it would never cross my mind to make a blanket statement that all engineers should work at startups" --> I completely agree. In fact, such blanket statements about almost any kind of advice is often naive.

arvinds 16y ago
I think it is more to make a point: http://www.paulgraham.com/discover.html http://www.paulgraham.com/discover.html

ashr 16y ago

I have no idea if there is a specific non-engineer that this post is talking about. The author of the referenced techcrunch article Bindu Reddy is certainly not a non-engineer : http://www.crunchbase.com/person/bindu-reddy http://www.crunchbase.com/person/bindu-reddy It also seems to me that this post is criticizing two sentences out of the entire article (http://techcrunch.com/2011/02/13/engineers-startups/ http://techcrunch.com/2011/02/13/engineers-startups/) without properly understanding them with rest of the context. All this article is saying is that due to the market warming up, now is a good time for engineers to work at a start up. That said, I agree with the point that dbasch is trying to make even though I don't think that they needed to be presented as a 'rebuttal'.

jshen 16y ago
All this article is saying is that due to the market warming up, now is a good time for engineers to work at a large company. Both of these are true, so the real fact is that now is a good time to be an engineeer.
ctide 16y ago
That crunchbase link says nothing about engineering, only product management. Am I missing something there?
bindupreddy 16y ago
Just for the record. I am an engineer. I worked at Elance for a couple of yrs in engineering. I also happened to write most of the front-end code for MyLikes in 2008/2009

jeanhsu 16y ago

Totally agree with a lot of the points you brought up. There are pluses to working at large companies, and many people are happy there. I left Google to work for myself and then joined a startup, and couldn't be happier. Wrote a response as well and included your post: http://www.jeanhsu.com/?p=247 http://www.jeanhsu.com/?p=247

earthaid 16y ago
I think Jean's post helpfully encapsulates the value of this discussion: that engineers (and non-engineers!) should certainly consider startups in general as an employment, educational, and financial experience that at a base level (say, in the context of a well-funded startup) will probably at least rival work in a larger corporate setting. But, as lylanm also points out below, perhaps the larger point is that there's not much merit in comparing the prospect of work at an abstract startup versus the prospect of work at an abstract large corporation --- especially if you don't have an offer from either. Whether you're looking for a first job or just a new job, it's certainly worth exploring whether a particular startup might be a better fun+financial+whatever fit for you than another opportunity that's been extended to you at a particular established company.

zeemonkee 16y ago

The argument seems to be BigCorp vs. startup. You can also work in a relatively sane, small-to medium sized stable business.

mryall 16y ago
In terms of the points cited in the article, there's not that much difference between BigCorp and a SME. Both would pay similar salaries and have stable long-term roles for engineers, which I think were the author's points.

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hackerbysea 16y ago

I have to say I'm a bit surprised by the sentiment favoring working at big companies among the majority of comments here. One possible explanation: 1) Statistically, most engineers work for big companies. 2) By human nature, people tend to stick to their current jobs, most likely a big company job. Here is a related thread at Quora: http://www.quora.com/If-I-want-to-be-an-entrepreneur-later-should-I-now-work-for-a-large-company-or-a-startup http://www.quora.com/If-I-want-to-be-an-entrepreneur-later-s...

sanj 16y ago

The "why" question wasn't answered in the actual article. It was a reasonable debunking of a deplorable TC article, but I was really interested in the difference in mindset.