
Advice for recent grad interested in one day starting a tech company? - 2016grad
I recently graduated from undergrad and am starting my first full-time job as a management consultant. I thought I wanted to go into investment banking then maybe tech later down the line so I did all my internships in finance. Meanwhile, I worked on a start up for 2 years in undergrad and loved it. I realized I loved wearing many hats, learning new things, and all the thrills that come with working in a growth &#x2F; start up environment. I taught myself how to program to be able to build web apps.<p>I stopped working on my start up but I know I want to take a stab at starting a tech company again. I want to work for maybe a year or two, gain some professional experience, save money and try again.<p>I don&#x27;t want to join a start up unless I was one of the first 10 people and really believed in it. I&#x27;d rather start my own thing and think I have it in me to succeed. Also, the work that excites me the most is Product Management, which has been hard to break into. Most startups pay really shitty for the roles that college grads might be qualified for bar SWE or PM.<p>I&#x27;d love to hear any and all advice that anyone on HN might have for someone like me. What do you wish you have known when you were 22 about starting a company?
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sjg007
Management consultancy gives you exposure into many other industries that
might be ripe for disruption or have specific needs that your future startup
could fill. If you grow in that business you might get to take on a higher
level leadership role in a future startup. That's important. If you find one
you like you can likely deep dive into it. And you learn how to talk to
business people and solve their problems. You learn to speak the language of
business which can be useful. Otherwise you have to focus on tech and raising
capital from tech oriented people vs businesses oriented people. Again not
necessarily bad, just different.

Are you a programmer? The programming part is important but only in that you
can quantify how long something will take etc... build an MVP and evaluate
hires etc... But you can hire programmers. Their is more value in
understanding the business problems/needs and then solving them.

You can choose to make programming a core competency and then you will have a
couple of super powers. But identifying the business need and building that is
the most important piece. A lot of tech/programmers get overly concerned with
building the best product or using the best technologies vs building to the
customer need.

So take the time to continue learning. If you want to jump into a startup you
will learn a lot but as you said pick carefully. A lot of it is luck. If you
stay in management consulting you will also find value if you seek it.

I think management consultants are disparaged unnecessarily in tech but I
think that is more of a industry wide recruiting scheme than actual reality.

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richardkeep
It's great working at a start-up. Don't let peanuts salary demoralize you

