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I still hold the best place for a person after graduation is a large but not monolith company. Avoid Google, Microsoft, Amazon, the giant companies where you're

I still hold the best place for a person after graduation is a large but not monolith company. Avoid Google, Microsoft, Amazon, the giant companies where you're just a cog in a giant machine. Go to a company like LinkedIn/Dropbox/Square. They are growing and are hiring, they aren't startup level anymore but most likely you will many benefits of startup life (freedom to move around, less clearly defined roles) without the long hours and risk. You also have the advice and mentorship of people who have already built a successful company.

krschultz 15y ago
Medium sized companies of all stripes seem to be the best for someone early in their career. Small enough to notice you, but big enough to have somewhere to move you once you are noticed. One of the biggest problems with a startup - if there are 10 engineers, where can you get promoted to? The converse problem at a large company, there are plenty of places to get promoted to but getting recognized is often hard. I've been at my job 9 months at a big company and have had 2 different bosses already. My boss's boss oversees 100 people and barely knows me. How do you built continuity and a reputation? Medium sized (50-250 people?) seems the best, but are sometimes hardest to find. They aren't on the S&P500, but they also aren't young enough to get press in Techcrunch.
- nostrademons 15y ago
  It's growth rate that matters, not size. I interned at a medium-sized (~150 employees) consulting firm in college. It was a pretty relaxed and functional atmosphere work-wise, but it would've been a career dead-end. It was far too easy to get pigeonholed into a single contract for a couple years and not learn anything.
nostrademons 15y ago
As Marc Andreesen wrote, you want a fast grower. If the company is growing, there will be plenty of opportunities for you to grow with it. If it isn't, you're fighting over a fixed-size pie with every other employer. LinkedIn/Dropbox/Square are great choices today. But so are Google, FaceBook, or (if you get into one of their growth products like AWS) Amazon. I've been with Google a bit over two years and am already more senior than 60% of employees. And my job description is anything but set in stone; it seems to have changed roughly every month for the past year, and I have a lot of latitude to set it myself.

krschultz 15y ago

Medium sized companies of all stripes seem to be the best for someone early in their career. Small enough to notice you, but big enough to have somewhere to move you once you are noticed. One of the biggest problems with a startup - if there are 10 engineers, where can you get promoted to? The converse problem at a large company, there are plenty of places to get promoted to but getting recognized is often hard. I've been at my job 9 months at a big company and have had 2 different bosses already. My boss's boss oversees 100 people and barely knows me. How do you built continuity and a reputation? Medium sized (50-250 people?) seems the best, but are sometimes hardest to find. They aren't on the S&P500, but they also aren't young enough to get press in Techcrunch.

nostrademons 15y ago
It's growth rate that matters, not size. I interned at a medium-sized (~150 employees) consulting firm in college. It was a pretty relaxed and functional atmosphere work-wise, but it would've been a career dead-end. It was far too easy to get pigeonholed into a single contract for a couple years and not learn anything.

nostrademons 15y ago

As Marc Andreesen wrote, you want a fast grower. If the company is growing, there will be plenty of opportunities for you to grow with it. If it isn't, you're fighting over a fixed-size pie with every other employer. LinkedIn/Dropbox/Square are great choices today. But so are Google, FaceBook, or (if you get into one of their growth products like AWS) Amazon. I've been with Google a bit over two years and am already more senior than 60% of employees. And my job description is anything but set in stone; it seems to have changed roughly every month for the past year, and I have a lot of latitude to set it myself.