9 Benefits of Working as a Professional Before Doing Your Own Start Up (5 mins Read)
Considering all the changes in the start up world there is a very pertinent question for people looking for jobs or who are already working in big companies i.e. whether they should take the plunge into the world of start-ups directly or should they work for large companies before going after their entrepreneurial dreams. The answer is unfortunately not an absolute yes or no. In addition to it, there are the success stories of the whiz-kids who have built top companies coming straight out of the college or even dropping out of the college. But, these are only a few, for every big company started by a whiz-kid, there are more than a thousand others which doesn’t do so well. So, the ratio is more than 1:1000. Moreover, we should remember that the average age of a successful entrepreneur is around 35 in spite of the presence of the eye catching whiz-kids. For every college drop out who is grabbing the attention there are many hundreds who are faltering in the middle.
Working for a big company is like attending and finishing your schooling on how to run a business. Someone coming out directly from a college is usually ignorant of the protocols and the processes of building and running a business. Let’s look at the reasons why one should work for a big company before doing a start up:
- Meet experienced and smart managers:
If you work in a big company you get the opportunity to meet smart and experienced people who have made great contributions in developing the huge business. So, wouldn’t it be fun to meet and work with the successful people and follow their ideas, strategies and the valuable tips on how to run the business.
- Big companies have well structured trainings:
All the big companies have a nicely structured training program in technology and the business processes, The HR helps in developing the training programs on the various diverse skill sets which are necessary for setting up and running an organization successfully.
- Easy access to expensive and good equipments and tools:
When you work in big companies you get easy access to the best of the equipments and tools and gather the practical experience of working on them. So, you don’t need to incur the huge costs of learning on how to handle those high tech equipments and the tools when you start your own business.
- Helps in building connections with influential people:
Influential people, be it within the company or people from outside the company who visit the company due to various business reasons, can be of great use when you go on your own. Like for example, the software and hardware vendors, who can be very handy in giving out the demo and the evaluation licenses when you start your own business.
- Helps in having some capital to bootstrap:
If you work in a large company for few years it will help you in building some capital which will be very handy when you start your own business. Businesses require investments and it is always good to self fund your venture especially during the initial stages.
- Provides great learning:
There is a wide range of the projects that one can work on if they are in large companies. You can make a great impact to this world by the learning you get of the field in which the company is working on. This learning helps immensely when you do your own start up.
- Get to travel to many places and acquire knowledge:
If you work in a large company you get to learn the culture of different countries and different people first hand as you get lot of opportunities to travel widely and come to know about the ways of the foreign culture. This is extremely important in today’s globalized environment as the world has become too small.
- Big companies have own intrapreneur programs:
Most of the leading companies have their own intrapreneur programs which provide you with the opportunities to test your potential of entrepreneurship within the safety net of a large organization.
- Working for a established companies helps you discover yourself:
If you work in a big company it helps you to discover your actual potential, Like you may be a good fit in small groups or in the collaboration opportunities or a loner who is on his own path.
Although, we read a lot about the start-ups and all the stuff, mostly about the fame and the money, but these are the outliers who are only a few. The actual reality is that starting a business always has a huge risk and the outcome is governed by external things which one can’t control. Starting a business also means being ready to sacrifice at least 2 to 3 years without any guaranteed fixed income.
Start ups are measured on three parameters which are value, uniqueness and traction. So, unless you have something very compelling on all the three factors, you need to be very careful before taking the plunge.
SUMMARY:
One should try to experience the start up journey at least once in their lifetime, as it gets your creativity flowing, might be a little painful at times and yet can be very satisfying. It surely gives a big boost to your career and there is a fair chance that you make good money out of it. But, at the end of it all, it is absolutely your personal decision, whichever path you take, you need to make sure that your heart and mind both are fully onto it to make it very interesting.