You may recall in Earlywork #34, our home boi Abhi took us through how to conduct due diligence and quickly analyse a startup.
This next piece is dedicated to help guide you through the process of deciding which offer to take and what you want to get out of the a job, which is of equal (if not more) importance.
Before applying and accepting any job offer, you should consider the following three things: Career Growth, Compensation, and Culture.
💡 Here is a practical guide to get started:
📈 Career Growth
In the early stages of your career, startups provide an interesting opportunity for you to learn a wide variety of skills with a huge amount of responsibility. However, in most cases, growth and progression will be fairly unstructured and will require you to think ahead and be more targeted compared to a standard corporate role. I’ll split this section into two focusing on early stage (Pre-seed, Seed, Series A) and later stage (Series B onwards) startups.
Early Stage:
In an early stage start-up, you’re likely to find that teams are built out quite sporadically and without much structure in mind. This reflects the period of high growth the startup is in where a lot of the business is trying to take advantage of early customer traction and develop their product quickly.
For those in the initial stages of their career, this can be a daunting environment but highly rewarding. In most instances you’ll be thrown straight into the deep end without a lot of guidance. Your role will likely span across multiple functions and you’ll be responsible for mission critical work. Figuring out how to float in the sea of uncertainty can be intimidating, but you’ll be given a lot more responsibility in comparison to corporate/later stage roles, and likely learn a lot faster.
For example, in my role as a Product & Growth Associate at Upstreet, an early-stage FinTech, the work that I took on was across product, growth, enterprise sales and customer success. Having the exposure to such varied work supercharged my learning experience and gave me responsibilities that I would never have had in a corporate role. If you aren’t a fan of extreme uncertainty and want some guidance early in your career, then a later stage startup might be the way to go.
Later Stage:
In a later stage startup, you’ll find that the organisation structure has been built out a lot more with 100 employees or so on its payroll. The startup should still be growing rapidly, but ideally at this stage the business has some form of Product-Market Fit, and is looking to access new markets.
Working in a later stage startup might be a great opportunity for those who don’t want to take on a huge amount of risk with an early stage startup, but also want to be in a dynamic, high impact role compared to traditional intern/graduate positions. Your role will probably be well defined, and if you choose to go above and beyond, you’ll be rewarded appropriately. You’ll also have more guidance, with more experienced managers who have probably gone through the same learning curve as you would be going through and can lean on them for support when needed.
Regardless of what stage startup you plan to join, keep in mind that startup organisation structures tend to be quite flat, and so in the interview process, it’s important to flesh out what your career progression might look like through the business.
Questions to ask the startup before joining:
- What are the learning opportunities in this role? Do you have a learning budget?
- What does success look like in this role?
- How do you see the team being built out in the future?
Questions to ask yourself:
- Is this startup in an industry I am passionate about?
- If you’re hoping to transition into another role, ask yourself if this startup has the role you wish to transition into. E.g. If the company doesn’t have any PMs, don’t accept a different role hoping to move into a PM role later.
- Does this startup have a good reputation? What are the founders' backgrounds?
💸 Compensation
Startup compensation packages can vary wildly depending on the stage of the startup and the amount of funding it has received from investors. Typically compensation at a startup consists of two parts: Cash and Equity.
Cash
Pretty self explanatory, the cash portion of your salary is how much actual money you’ll get in your bank account. For early stage startups, you should expect salaries that are lower than what you might receive in the corporate world. As the startup grows, you should see this amount grow quickly as well.
Depending on your personal circumstances you might prefer to have a higher cash salary, but for most young people, it might be possible to take on more risk and accept a salary with more equity options.
Equity
As an early employee in a startup, you’ll likely be incentivised to remain at the startup by receiving a part of your salary as equity in the business. In most cases, you’ll unlock a portion of equity on a yearly basis, meaning the longer you stay with a company, the more equity you’ll own. To determine the value of your equity, make sure you understand the long term viability of the business, what percentage of the company the stock is worth, and what the expected exit strategy would be.
Questions to ask the startup before joining:
- What does compensation look like as I move into more senior roles?
- Are there any performance bonuses?
- How much runway is left for the business?
- What valuation would you realistically exit at?
- If receiving equity, what percentage of the company do these shares represent?
Questions to ask yourself:
- Can I afford to accept part of my salary in the form of equity?
- Is this offer at market rate? Check Glassdoor or Think and Grow’s Salary guide
- Is the trade-off between learning and earning worth it? E.g. In some roles, you might not learn much and will not be well compensated either. Make sure the trade-off is worth it by asking the questions in the Career growth section.
🎉 Culture
Externally, startups seem like fun places to work. Free food, free drinks, free t-shirts and monthly/quarterly offsites. However, peek below the surface, and you might find that some startups are severely lacking in the culture department. Given the speed at which everything happens in startup land, culture sometimes can take a backseat on an ever-growing list of to-dos.
Culture is about the values that the startup advocates for and that is manifested in the startup’s employees. At the early stages, the founders shape the culture so it's important to directly ask about this in the interview process. A good way to test for culture is to see how employees work in the office with each other. Try and observe the way that people communicate with each other. Is it easy going or structured? Look around and get a feel for the general demographic of the employees. Are they around the same age as you or a lot older? People thrive in different environments, so figure out what style of working you like and see if the startup’s culture embodies that. If you aren’t able to meet the team in person, it’s worthwhile reaching out to other team members for quick coffee chats over Zoom.
Questions to ask the startup before joining:
- What are the core values of the company? Can I see a recent employee culture survey?
- How do people like to work with each other? What type of people don’t succeed in this company?
- What does mentorship look like within the company?
- Can I join a company social event? E.g. Friday drinks or a team lunch.
Questions to ask yourself:
- Do the people in the company look like they are enjoying themselves? Try and observe this during your coffee chats with the team.
- Do I want to be working with this demographic? E.g. some places might be male dominated, or predominantly older employees.
When making your decision, take a holistic look at everything the startup is offering you. You’re there to learn and grow into a long career so don’t make any decision lightly. Every career move has some level of risk, but applying the rough guidelines detailed above can hopefully help you decide which risks you’re comfortable in taking.
