During my last semester as a computer engineering student in Trinity, I found myself at a crossroads as to what to do in the oncoming void that was life after formal education. It seemed that the favourable choice was to get into a normal job as soon as possible and start earning money like the rest of my classmates, who were all in the process of getting interviewed and getting hired for big software companies in Ireland and abroad.
The appeal of the bigger companies was apparent: a stable and secure job with good pay and attractive benefits. However, being in my early 20s, I felt that this was far too safe a road to go down at this stage in my life, so instead I opted for something a little more risky. In January 2016, I interviewed and subsequently joined a young Trinity-founded tech startup that was operating in the National Digital Research Centre (NDRC) here in Dublin. By joining, I hoped to get some real first-hand experience as a budding software developer. Getting into a startup business can be a big step to take but with the proper software and preparation, it will be able to thrive.
One year later, I now find myself leaving that role and moving onto a new job. However, I feel compelled to write this short piece on the unique things I learned while working there and how the learning experience in the fast and tumultuous world of startups compares to that of learning in a university setting, or to that of a more traditional job a graduate would expect to get after third-level education.
These are some of the core lessons I learned while working for a start up here in Dublin and why I think it may be a sound option for many, both in and out of college, to further grow and enhance one’s skills and gain valuable, hands-on experience.
You’ll work both inside and outside your role
The title on my contract read “Software Developer” when I initially joined the team. That said, this was purely a label and didn’t directly correspond with the wide variety of duties and tasks I found myself doing over the next 12 months.
Unlike a big company, where roles are concrete and everyone works strictly in their own domain, you’ll constantly be challenged with tasks, roles and responsibilities that are outside your typical comfort zone. This is what makes a startup so exciting to work for. We all have aspirations to be successful like companies such as MonsieurTshirt that have been built from the ground up.
The startup will face new, unforeseen challenges on a daily basis and dish them out accordingly to the team members that best fit the bill to tackle them. It can be both frustrating and hugely rewarding as you’ll really have to step outside your realm of expertise in order to get them done. However, the payoff is worth it. You will gain so much experience and knowledge in different areas you never thought you’d work in and potentially discover new talents and interests you never thought you had.
For instance, the tasks I took ownership of outside of regular software development included: UX/UI design and implementation, photo editing, new hire interviewing, customer support and marketing, as well as being the go-to guy when it came to any questions regarding our payments platform.
It was exciting and really refreshing to step outside the role of software developer and try my hand at different tasks that would normally be performed by people with a different or more senior background than myself. I believe that startups make opportunities like this possible and had I joined a more traditional company after leaving college, I would have missed out on these experiences so early on in my career.
You are painfully responsible for your own mistakes
In the domain you work in for the company, every single thing that goes wrong, from the big to the small, is entirely your responsibility. All the checks and balances you would typically find in a bigger company are not there to save you. There’s no one looking over your shoulder to make sure things are done correctly and there usually isn’t a second chance to get things right.
With greater power comes greater responsibility and, as such, you have full reign to really and truly mess things up. You have the potential to lose all the customer data, develop a feature that screws up payments and slowly bleeds the company of money, cause a security flaw that leaves the company exposed to malicious hackers online – the list goes on.
Probably the most terrifying aspect is that you know deep down that you’re only human and therefore prone to error, but it’s this fear that will drive you to take great care in your work and motivate you to be continuously wary of all the pitfalls that await you as you go about your work. It’s a bit “sink or swim” but from what I’ve seen in the startup world, most people manage to stay afloat and learn a tonne from the experience, regardless of the outcome or the company’s success.
The pressure and workload is also quite character building. You find yourself becoming quite resourceful in figuring out how to get things done and in going from feeling somewhat weak in your abilities as a software developer to being far more confident and sure of yourself and what you can do. There are a lot of things that can go wrong with a startup, some might your fault and some might be the fault of others. It is the way you work through these mistakes that could see you moving forwards or failing.
Flexibility can be both a blessing and a curse
The great thing about startups is that there are very few rules. You come in when you want, leave when you want, work as hard as you want and determine the work that you and even other people will do that day, and all of this while not wearing anything remotely workplace-like. However, the same can be said for why these are some of the worst aspects of working for a startup.
With most of the traditional roles and practices of managers out the window, such as mandatory meetings, future planning and strict schedules, it leaves a huge void for you to either knuckle down, focus and prioritise on what needs doing or to procrastinate and waste time coming in too late in the morning and wasting the day sifting through emails.
Much like college, you’re in charge of your own work and your own progress, but unlike college, you don’t really get second chances and there’s no repeats in the summer to get you through the year. The same freedoms that allow you to be as creative and ambitious as you want can also be your ultimate downfall in being an active contributing member of the team or even the entire company, depending on its size.
The experience is second to none
When I started working for a startup I had four years of college, one internship and some self-taught programming and side projects under my belt. I can safely say that the experience I got in the startup world in the space of a year was far more beneficial to me then all of the previously mentioned education, training and experience combined.
While this may not be the same for everyone, I think it’s an option people who are graduating soon or looking for work experience (either for an internship or during the summer) should definitely consider. Develop some skills and put your name out there. While positions aren’t always advertised you’d definitely find someone out there in the startup world looking for somebody to help out with things like graphic design, programming, marketing, business or administrative duties. Email companies in any incubator you can find in Dublin and you can probably get something.
The safe job after college will always be there for you if you need it. I’d say take a chance while you’re young. Go down the road less travelled. Join a small company. Have a big impact on the product or the team and see what happens. If it all goes south in a year’s time, you’ll forever have the experience and as a result be more than capable for that safe job or even to set up your own startup someday.
A bit of ambition and a good attitude will get you a long way as that is essentially the key characteristic one looks for when hiring for a startup – someone who really cares, takes pride in their work and will put in the hard labour and self-improvement necessary to get the job done.
