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Have you ever worked at a larger company, or is all your experience in startups? I ask because the culture is vastly different. Hierarchies and politics happen

Have you ever worked at a larger company, or is all your experience in startups? I ask because the culture is vastly different. Hierarchies and politics happen more and more as company sizes increase. The quality of leadership varies greatly and you see a lot more poor leaders focused on the bureaucracy which can be exceedingly frustrating if you have only ever worked in startups. At the same time, you also see more good leaders who make their little slice of the company a joyful area to work while shielding you from everything else. It all depends on exactly where you land and who your boss is. That doesn't mean the transition is a bad idea. There is some peace and stability in getting a steady paycheck from a larger company. But you should realize that you are just trading one set of problems for another.

silexrpr 2y ago
This would be my first time in a big company. Thank you for the advice, I do realize that the change of pace, level of control will be something that I’ll notice immediately. Any thoughts in terms of challenges for your tech skills considering that I never managed big scale? Was it hard to adapt to a new environment in general?
- codingdave 2y ago
  Tech skills were not a problem - the demands in general are lower both for skills and the speed to learn new tech. The skills that needed more work were communication and process skills. When you cannot just handle everything yourself and need to work within larger processes and team, you need to be sure that your communication is good enough that information isn't lost along the way, and that you can both adapt to work with different processes as well as look for ways to improve how your team works... without being pushy or unintentionally criticizing the people who set up the processes in the first place. It also takes more acceptance - there are less time pressures and more human pressures, so a little extra respect towards everyone and seeking to understand their rationale for what they do and how they do it can go a long way.

silexrpr 2y ago

This would be my first time in a big company. Thank you for the advice, I do realize that the change of pace, level of control will be something that I’ll notice immediately. Any thoughts in terms of challenges for your tech skills considering that I never managed big scale? Was it hard to adapt to a new environment in general?

codingdave 2y ago
Tech skills were not a problem - the demands in general are lower both for skills and the speed to learn new tech. The skills that needed more work were communication and process skills. When you cannot just handle everything yourself and need to work within larger processes and team, you need to be sure that your communication is good enough that information isn't lost along the way, and that you can both adapt to work with different processes as well as look for ways to improve how your team works... without being pushy or unintentionally criticizing the people who set up the processes in the first place. It also takes more acceptance - there are less time pressures and more human pressures, so a little extra respect towards everyone and seeking to understand their rationale for what they do and how they do it can go a long way.