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I never understood the supposed attraction of "just like a startup, but in a big company!". That appears to mean that you will work in a small team, putting in

I never understood the supposed attraction of "just like a startup, but in a big company!". That appears to mean that you will work in a small team, putting in unsustainable hours, but not receive the financial reward that a successful startup could provide. I've worked in several startups, and occasional death marches are unavoidable. They don't work month in and month out. But enduring that kind of life for just salary is nuts.

andrewem 6y ago
The other notable thing about “just like a startup but in a big company” (often for startups which have been acquired) is the frequent claim that the startup will be left alone by the rest of the company. Every single process and incentive is against that remaining true. Maybe in some cases you can hope for the acquired startup to be the pet project of the acquirer’s founder/CEO?
- geophile 6y ago
  I knew that to work out exactly once, (not a company I was at).
Tommah 6y ago
> the supposed attraction of "just like a startup, but in a big company!" I think the advantage is supposed to be that you won't come in one day and hear your boss say "Guess what? We're broke."
- mgkimsal 6y ago
  > I think the advantage is supposed to be that you won't come in one day and hear your boss say "Guess what? We're broke." Sure... but you may still come in and find "this project has been nixed". Upside is that you may still have a 'job' in the bigger company, but everything you worked on may be thrown away, you may lose whatever political power your project had, etc. Certainly there's an 'immediate safety net' issue of "you may have a paycheck next week", but doesn't address any of the emotional stuff that goes along with "we'll have a scrappy startup mentality!" I had been in something similar - not quite a 'startup in a large company' situation, but similar. And... we hit a "hey, this project is being shut down, and there's no other budget in the company for this team". So.. the company itself was still going OK - everyone else kept rolling along - but a handful of us were effectively cut adrift for a bit. Some were able to be assigned to other internal teams, some weren't.
  - p_l 6y ago
    A project at big financial company... At some point around March we learnt post-factum that the project, mostly staffed by contract workers (aka "B2B"), nearly lost pretty much all of non-managerial staff, because parent company of the group (a german corp) made decision to cancel all B2B contracts. Our project barely survived because of some fast talking, and by becoming "important enough" the fact that canceling the contracts would leave them with no "doers" on it was the main reason we didn't get "sorry, you're fired" email.
gedy 6y ago
> I never understood the supposed attraction of "just like a startup, but in a big company!" Imho it's frequently used to falsely motivate junior/inexperienced into working crazy hours that they might get some financial or other rewards like a startup.

andrewem 6y ago

The other notable thing about “just like a startup but in a big company” (often for startups which have been acquired) is the frequent claim that the startup will be left alone by the rest of the company. Every single process and incentive is against that remaining true. Maybe in some cases you can hope for the acquired startup to be the pet project of the acquirer’s founder/CEO?

geophile 6y ago
I knew that to work out exactly once, (not a company I was at).

Tommah 6y ago

> the supposed attraction of "just like a startup, but in a big company!" I think the advantage is supposed to be that you won't come in one day and hear your boss say "Guess what? We're broke."

mgkimsal 6y ago
> I think the advantage is supposed to be that you won't come in one day and hear your boss say "Guess what? We're broke." Sure... but you may still come in and find "this project has been nixed". Upside is that you may still have a 'job' in the bigger company, but everything you worked on may be thrown away, you may lose whatever political power your project had, etc. Certainly there's an 'immediate safety net' issue of "you may have a paycheck next week", but doesn't address any of the emotional stuff that goes along with "we'll have a scrappy startup mentality!" I had been in something similar - not quite a 'startup in a large company' situation, but similar. And... we hit a "hey, this project is being shut down, and there's no other budget in the company for this team". So.. the company itself was still going OK - everyone else kept rolling along - but a handful of us were effectively cut adrift for a bit. Some were able to be assigned to other internal teams, some weren't.
- p_l 6y ago
  A project at big financial company... At some point around March we learnt post-factum that the project, mostly staffed by contract workers (aka "B2B"), nearly lost pretty much all of non-managerial staff, because parent company of the group (a german corp) made decision to cancel all B2B contracts. Our project barely survived because of some fast talking, and by becoming "important enough" the fact that canceling the contracts would leave them with no "doers" on it was the main reason we didn't get "sorry, you're fired" email.

gedy 6y ago

> I never understood the supposed attraction of "just like a startup, but in a big company!" Imho it's frequently used to falsely motivate junior/inexperienced into working crazy hours that they might get some financial or other rewards like a startup.