you don't need to work at a startup, you should have founder friends or even mentor types from people who are around 12 months ahead of you. if you can impress

you don't need to work at a startup, you should have founder friends or even mentor types from people who are around 12 months ahead of you. if you can impress some small group of people you should gain access to their network and so on. there are other serious benefits of frequently talking to people in the same situation as you (startups can be extremely depressing for one)