

Ask HN: Why don't more UK graduates want to join start-ups? - ian

Last May we organised a recruitment fair in London for UK hackers to meet local start-ups. YC companies included Lanyrd, Songkick, Tuxebo and Webmyd. It got more traction than we expected with hundreds of attendees. More details at www.siliconmilkroundabout.com<p>We announced a follow up event this Sunday that has had a strange response pattern. We've had thousands of registrations, but they're mostly from experienced developers rather than current students and recent graduates. My personal goal for the event is to help graduates see that there are more options out there than just the obvious banking/consulting/Google routes so I'm trying to make sure we also reach current students.<p>The event is free to attend, showcases 500+ roles at over 100 UK based start-ups from Mind Candy to Shazam but hasn't yet gotten real traction at universities across the UK despite hitting mailing lists, flyering etc.<p>Does anyone on hacker news have any ideas on how we could increase awareness of the event amongst current UK CS students? Do we have to take the event to campuses like the banks do with their milkrounds?<p>If you're a UK CS or engineering student have you heard about the event? If not what would have been the best way to reach you? What career options are more visible on campus (banks, Google etc)?<p>Thanks!
Ian (co-founder Songkick)
======
hailpixel
I'm a founder of Lyst, one of the companies who will be involved in the event.
I have two theories about why the traction for so-to-be graduates hasn't been
amazing.

1) Location. While London is definitely business and cultural center of
Britain, I believe it's a bit of a slog for students to travel down to the
recruitments fair, especially since most of the best universities are located
outside of the city. SO going to them would definitely help.

2) Most of the companies pitching are relatively unknown to the general
masses. My best hires are people who either approached us because they like
why we're doing, or people in my professional circles. Professional developers
fit nicely into these two buckets, were most students don't. Great companies
like Tuxebo and Conversocial don't really have mass appeal. Subsequently, it's
hard to get a student who doesn't truly understand the company/space excited
about being a part of the team.

The second problem is even further exacerbated as early startups don't want
"employees". They want "Employee #1"; someone who is passionate and ready to
help push the company forward.

It's a tricky problem.

~~~
jlind
_The second problem is even further exacerbated as early startups don't want
"employees". They want "Employee #1"; someone who is passionate and ready to
help push the company forward._

I'm in my senior year of college here in the US and this definitely nails it
for me. I've had some solid internships where I've done actual coding / ops /
etc, but I don't feel like I'm at the technical level where I could graduate
and make huge impacts for a startup.

Are startups who are past the "Employee #1" phase (or even employees 2-5, I'd
imagine) in a different position in regards to this? (ie more willing to bring
on a recent grad, because they already have strong technical
employees/leadership pushing the company forward)

~~~
hailpixel
My company is early stage still & we still have a very high bar for
developers. That said, I hire based on a persons ability to perform, not the
time they've been doing it.

If you have a github & portfolio that shows you can create, have an interest
in what my company does, and can pitch it to me, I'd hire you.

~~~
jlind
Maybe this is something that many grads might not realize too, as it's quite
different in contrast with hiring processes associated with Enterprise Company
XYZ.

It's one of my favorite parts about startup culture in general, though.
Whenever I hear people saying stuff like this (re: hiring performance vs
experience) my first thought is almost always "where do I sign up?!"

------
robfitz
I think a lot of students just aren't aware it's possible... All through uni,
literally zero people told me startups even existed as an option. No
professor, no career counsellor, no guest speaker... nobody.

I accidentally signed up for a course called "project proposal" thinking it
was about submitting research to conferences, but it was actually about
pitching ideas to VCs. Rocked my world.

Although it wasn't quite what I imagine they were hoping for, I dropped out
after that semester and have spent the last 5 years happily entrenched in
startups.

My best guess would be that they do not know the option exists and/or they do
not believe they can do it. It does and they can.

So spread the word!

~~~
Peroni
Plus there is also the legacy fear that start-ups are a risk. Students aim for
big companies and recognised brands as it's entrenched in their psyche that
they must build a decent CV from the minute they step out into the big bad
world.

~~~
ian
I think that's somewhat mitigated as the UK develops a few more household name
brand start-ups like Moshi Monsters and Shazam but I agree it's an issue.

I think the key point we need to make there is that as a developer you want to
go wherever you'll learn the most, and start-ups credibly offer that - both by
exposure to the broader aspects of building a successful business and also by
density of talent.

~~~
n9com
I don't think you can call Moshi Monsters and Shazam a 'startup' anymore.

------
dmitri1981
A few guesses:

a) The likes of Morgan Stanley, PWC and suchlike put a lot of effort into
always being at the forefront of student minds, by sponsoring societies, etc.
That often means they are the default first choice. They also organise a ton
of events to show students how nice they are.

b) Money. No getting away from this one. A decent starting salary might be in
the region of 25k, the companies mentioned above usually pay somewhere around
35k. That 10k makes a huge difference after 3-4 years of living in squalor.

c) Inexperience. Coming out of university a job is more-or-less a job. You
write some code, get paid, that's it. It takes a bit of personal experience to
fully appreciate the corporate reality of legacy code, bureaucracy and
incompetence. In my experience it often takes those encounters with the beast
that is corporate coding to make you run for the hills or startups.

d) Peers and parental pressure. Your mates are all getting golden hand shakes
and nice lunches at Big Corp, it is natural to want the same. Also, when you
get that job offer from PWC or similar, your parents' eyes light up with
excitement and they run off to tell all their friends about it. When you get a
job at a three man company, their reaction is likely to be mild confusion at
best. Sad but true.

~~~
ian
These are all great points. On a) perhaps we need to use the milkroundabout
brand to start sponsoring stuff during the year, similar to how the larger
corporations do. On d) I totally agree with that. My main hack around that has
been to try to have dinner with the parents/partners of those joining us to
try to get them to buy into the opportunity and people behind the start-ups as
well. That's also one area where in the UK, having brand name investors like
YC and Index behind you really helps.

~~~
mmahemoff
Definitely makes sense for milkroundabout to sponsor events and build
awareness of startups in general. Individual startups don't have the resources
and longevity to continuously be building awareness over the long term.

------
sthulbourn
I've been really lucky, straight out of university I've managed to only work
with startups. I've had the opportunity to work with a few startups to get
them to a first release [I graduated and moved to Germany helping startups as
a contractor].

But generally, working for startups isn't mentioned as an option to students
at _any_ point during their course. This is perhaps an issue with university
faculty, they probably assume it's not an option since they don't have any
contacts to any startups. Placing a call to Microsoft recruitment is easy.

Another reason might be an issue with the education students receive at
university, I feel as if only 10 students out of a class of 120 people will
know how to program correctly. Startups normally want people with lots of
knowledge in many different areas, they don't want people who only know how to
do certain things; Hiring a graduate who can only code HTML isn't normally an
option for startups since they need the most out of the little money that
have.

Until at least 50% of a graduating class are able to perform in multiple
areas, backend, front-end, perhaps mobile in multiple languages (they don't
have to know them amazingly well, but enough to program efficiently whilst
checking documentation – when needed!), startups aren't really an option for
most graduates. You would be amazed at how many students can't debug problems
in their code, because they're taught to just copy code they find on the
internet or on some sort of Blackboard style intranet app.

TL;DR: Students graduate with piss poor skills and until more students
graduate with the needed skills, they'll never find themselves in a startup.

------
scorchin
I'm a recent graduate and I attended the previous milkroundabout.

Let me start by saying that I've always hated recruitment fairs — you're
treated like cattle and rarely get to speak to companies (read: HR
departments) properly. I found it to be a similar situation with the
milkroundabout event only instead of HR departments it was founders and
developers.

I don't agree with "selling the brand" of milkroundabout as it will easily be
confused with similarly named events/sites/companies. Instead aim to do guest
lectures at universities on topics that are bound to get students interested.

If you're the ones with interesting work, why aren't you talking about what
you do? Students already get told that they are under prepared for what
working life is like and you can expose them to what you've done. You could
easily compare this to what life was like at <insert safe boring company>
before. If you're so inclined.

Pick topics that are interesting to the students that you want to attract.
Then go on a tangent about start-ups, the culture, and the experience. If you
show students what it's like to be in a start-up, they'll get involved and
tell their friends.

In summary, sell them a better lifestyle than the usual suspects.

~~~
ian
I'd be curious to hear how you found the last event? Our goal was that all the
start-up booths would be staffed by developers at the start-ups, so you'd be
able to find out what the culture and experience of their start-up was like,
directly. Did that happen? Sounds like it was much like a typical recruitment
fair for you, which is a failure on our part.

~~~
scorchin
_> Our goal was that all the start-up booths would be staffed by developers at
the start-ups, so you'd be able to find out what the culture and experience of
their start-up was like, directly._

Yes, but not as much as I'd like to. I found it far too easy to get stuck in a
slow-moving crowd or just wait in a queue to talk.

In the end I just stayed by the bar near the bar staff and talked to
developers as they went to grab a beer. It seemed to work better and the devs
were far more relaxed talking with a beer in hand. Same goes for outside when
they went to grab a cigarette.

------
robinwarren
When I left university I interviewed at a small company and a startup but in
both cases they were just interviews for jobs I got through a recruitment
consultant. That was all I knew of how to get a job. I think the problem is
that recent graduates are unaware they could be doing anything other than
looking at cwjobs and phoning a recruitment agency up.

Possibly timing is an issue, right before or after final exams may catch
students when getting a job is more top of mind?

One other idea might be to organise some paid internships. If you have a large
number of companies in willing to take interns on (point them to Joels 'smart
and gets things done' if they want to see the benefits of getting smart people
interested in their company before they leave education) then that may give
the CS departments a reason to get undergraduates interested in a startup
career.

Good luck with the event this weekend, it looks fantastic.

~~~
ian
Paid summer internships is a smart point. Many of the companies exhibiting at
the event are keen to having summer tech interns, and perhaps if we packaged
that up better we'd get more engagement from university tutors. Maybe we
should create a listing of all the summer internships available as well.
Thanks for a helpful idea.

~~~
DonskiFarrell
I think this would create a lot of interest in the start-up area. As part of
my course there was a compulsory 6-month placement in industry. Most of the
students were blissfully unaware of the start-up opportunities available,
especially when the big players were dangling large money incentives and
holding big promotion events. Also, if you took a typical internship with a
bank, etc, the chances are that you got offered a graduate job. This in itself
would prevent a lot of the students looking further for other opportunities
even if they were being promoted.

The only time I even had a hint of the start-up world was the odd email from
the career officer. (I actually remember the SongKick advert. I was really
tempted to apply, even though you were just looking for a graduate position.
In hindsight, I should have tried my luck :))

What would be useful in promoting the internships would be a start-up demo-
day, where bunch of start-ups would come in and showcase their product/vision,
development technologies, and any other 'cool stuff'.

Edit: To clarify, rather that a start-up fair, where students stumble about,
the demo-day would be contained in a lecture room with a proper presentation
and QA session. These types of events were always packed in uni.

~~~
ian
Great feedback, thanks. I think some kind of on campus event is the next step
and I love the idea of making it about product demos not standard booths.

------
qF
I'm currently a student (in Holland), and I've been to a few recruitment fairs
and if I were to get an email or see a flyer about another one I would
probably not even read it. Most recruitment fairs are just terrible. Companies
will send the prettiest girls they can find in their HR and PR departments
with the sole goal of getting your contact info plus some buzzwords so they
can add those to their database. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against
pretty girls, but they're not actually interested in me as a person nor do
they have a lot of knowledge about the company which usually makes recruitment
fairs a big waste of time.

On campus presentations on the other hand are a fantastic way of putting
yourself on the radar. I don't mean the recruitment fairs that some Uni's will
have on campus, but rather smaller events. I recently went to the final
presentation of a phd project and there were 4-5 companies giving a short talk
what they did in that field and afterwards they had stands with demos and the
actual people who get their hands dirty were there to talk to you
(extensively). To me the latter (where it's directly related to a topic I
might be interested in) is much more interesting and inspiring than some
impersonal recruitment fair.

------
fumbe
Great post! I'm an MSc Tech Entrepreneurship student with a software
background and would either join an existing startup or launch my own. I'm
actually attending the silicon milkroundabout event this Sunday.

I can relate to the problem in the following ways:

(1) Culture - The UK and Europe in general does not have the same
'entrepreneurship spirit' like they do in the US. The vast majority are
looking for stability, rather than risk and rewards (both personal and
financial). A recent article published in the telegraph stated that my
university (UCL), has the highest number of graduates going into self-
employment, and the figure was still just 2.4%, so you can imagine the rest.
<http://tgr.ph/tTMHaJ>

(2) Value - There not so many people from a software background in my course
(around 10%), so I tried to reach out to undergraduate Computer Science
students in the same department in order to organise something similar to the
silicon milkroundabout, but just for students on campus, i.e. match up budding
tech entrepreneurs with developers and aspiring hackers. We received less than
3% interest, which kind of reflects the newspaper figure. I don't think they
see the value of joining a start-up at the early stage.
<http://econ.st/uOw02e>

(3) Presence - In the last few months, even though the term has just started
I’ve received a lot of emails about recruitment fairs on campus with banks,
financial institutions, large corporate IT companies etc. These are normally
oversubscribed and I'm sure a lot of these graduates will end up in those
companies, as they are recruited whilst still in their final year. Perhaps
finance might be a factor as well. A lot of people can’t afford to work for
‘shares and equity’ after graduating with thousands of pounds in student
debts, they would rather clear or reduce those as quickly as possible.

So, I would say, if you want to get more students taking part rather than
established developers, you would need to come to campus and organise events
there. Maybe do a tour around UK universities. Someone I met at a recent
techmeetups event is actually founding a startup that teaches kids in school
how to write python code. If they start early they are more likely to do it
out of interest, rather than to get a secure job with a bank.

------
fernandose
I'm currently a masters student at UCL and I'm too surprised at the small
scale of start-up culture here. I've been talking to many london universities
to bring hackers and start-up enthusiasts together to collaborate and see what
everyone is working on. Numbers are small, but there is talent out there
working on cool ideas.

In my opinon in this case it's a matter of exposure, here at UCL I didn't see
any advertisements about siliconmilkroundabout; and I bet more non-technical
founders knew about it than computer scientists. Universities are a hard one
to crack, you really have to target down hard to the societies(techsoc) and
the right areas (malet place).

~~~
ian
what could we do in the next 3 days to really crank up awareness at UCL? We
have posters, fliers and can send someone from Songkick or another start-up
down to speak about the event and the start-ups that will be represented.
Thanks!

~~~
SaintSal
I'm sure some guys at the UCL Hatchery would be willing to help spread the
word too. Email me at smile@saintsal.com and I'll put you guys in touch.

~~~
ian
will do, thanks

------
jedcomyn
Ian,

I currently work at onefinestay, one of the attendees at milkroundabout. (I am
the one that has been feeding @milkroundabout with some 'reasons why you
should work in startups' via Tiff Philippou)

I came to the company from KPMG, having spent 4 years 'earning' my ACA. Those
4 years would have been far better spent learning the operational and
technical ropes at a start up but it did give me an understanding of finance
and all it entails.

I agree with a number of opinions below that might stifle traction - peer
expectation of job/employer/salary, lack of visibility of start ups, location
of the Milkroundabout. (Could there be mini satellite events linked by
webcasts/interactive discussion boards/MMOG type virtual event?)

But a key one is simply 'What can I/would I do?' Large multinationals have
very defined learning and career paths usually linked to professional
qualifications that, theoretically at least, will give them at platform in
this uncertain world. Start ups offer no standard day/week/year which is their
greatest selling point (to those who have tasted corporate life!) but can be
daunting for those fresh out of a structured school system. Also for non CS
grads - what roles are available to them that they can research prior to
graduating.....

There might be an opportunity to develop a learning framework that encompasses
the necessary skills that 'Start ups' require and provide support to these new
joiners as well as more information from recent employees as to their back
ground and current role.

Jed

jed(dot)comyn(At)onfinestay(dot)com

------
arctangent
I think your idea is superb, but your website would be better if there was a
way to search through all the available jobs to see if there is anything in
particular of interest.

For instance, it would be useful to be able to see which funded companies were
looking for a junior designer and then be able to look at the actual job
postings themselves (e.g. via link to that company's website).

I hope you have great success with this event. I have a friend attending and
there's a good chance I will come down from Leeds one day to take a look at
one of your future events.

~~~
ian
Thanks for the feedback. We'll consider adding a list of all available jobs,
that's a good idea.

Re Leeds - how did your friend who is coming hear about the event? Are there
email lists that we should have targeted that we didn't?

~~~
paulsb
When I lived in Leeds I used to attend the Open Coffee meetings (monthly) and
the BarCamps (annually), where people would talk about start-ups and start-up
events, so you could target these meetings (if they are still going). I doubt
you could target students directly without appearing to be spammers.

You (perhaps collectively with other roundabouters) could try holding some
sort of competition for students. I am sure academics at universities would
help to promote something like that to their students and you would be able to
see which students are capable of building things and getting things done,
i.e. which are potential hires. It could also expose students to the types of
work, and the style of working, that occurs at a start-up.

------
jmedwards
Hi Ian

Firstly kudos on your patience and determination with Silicon Milk Roundabout.
I've been a remote admirer of the project and I hope at some point I'll be
able to engage more directly with the project, not least when it comes to our
(www.kayako.com) own hiring. Silicon Roundabout and everything else associated
with it is something I feel strongly about.

As far as reaching out to CS and engineering (etc) soon-to-be-graduates, have
you been in touch with computer science and engineering faculties in
universities, making an introduction and asking for them to send an email out
to students?

Even easier would be to contact the social/ents society for the CS
department/engineering faculties. Those societies will be more willing to send
an email blast about careers events like these.

For example: <http://cssbristol.co.uk/>
<http://www.cs.ox.ac.uk/societies/COGS/> <http://www.cs-society.co.uk/site/>

Another idea might be the British Computer Society. They have a Young
Professionals Group (I've posted about SMR to the LinkedIn group), and the
main body of BCS would probably be more than happy to help with promotion.

Hope this helps and apologies if it was all already obvious and tried.

Edit: Seems I am late with a couple of those suggestions. Oh well, I'll keep
thinking.

~~~
jmedwards
Thinking out loud... I think one of the problems is that on-campus careers
events feel like bubbles. There isn't an obvious incentive for undergrads
outside of London to travel to the event.

Some kind of representation at Universities themselves would solve this.
Whether that is a small presence at a careers fair representing an annual SMR
event in London, or perhaps (even better) a visiting speaker from a startup
telling their startup story and to promote the actual idea of working for a
startup.

As others before me have suggested, I think the barrier to getting students to
the event isn't just about event logistics and promotion, but about culture
and perceptions about startups too.

Does the startup route even cross their mind to begin with?

------
comm_it
This may be a bit of quiet topic now but I still thought I'd throw in my
comments.

I interned at a start up in my penultimate year and it was both a great
experience, and I got paid (not a lot, but enough). I got to learn about
business practices quickly, I did some meaningful work and contributed towards
several products, we practised agile methods and it was all round a good
experience. There was, however, more legacy code here than I've had to deal
with before.

In my final year I started applying to more start ups (in London this time),
and got offers from a number of them, I didn't take any of them. Why? They all
wanted me to work for free. Working for free in central London? I don't need
the experience of an unknown company that bad (harsh CV reality).

So I instead did the usual and got a (well paying) internship at a big bank. I
had a great time, didn't run into very much legacy code, worked with lots of
very cool, and very new, technologies, and learnt a lot about technology and
business. It didn't take much consideration when deciding to take their job
offer afterwards, turning down my MSc offers.

The kind of work I was going to be doing from day one mattered a lot to me,
and it didn't seem to be much of a comparison. There just really wasn't much
to entice me into a startup again.

------
roblobue
Hi Guys,

I'm a recent grad (just over 2 years ago now) and I have a startup in the UK.
I'll be honest this is the first time I've heard about the event.

I think grads / final years are even more scared now than ever about finding a
job and while that makes it a perfect time to try and start you own thing, I
worry it just adds even more risk to a what they feel is already a dismal
employment situation.

At Bath Uni we had an excellent Career's service however and if you wanted to
do campus events or even just mailers, I would recommend getting in touch with
university career centres. You can even ask them to pass your details on to
the CS department and getting them the mail the event (yes, spam in a way) it
to all the CS students. They did that at Bath if it was particularly relevant.

It may just be a case of students getting tired of all these career fairs
which often don't amount to anything. I know in my final year, by the time I'd
seen KPMG/Accenture/Deloitte/Barclays/BT/HP/etc I couldn't take any more being
deceived about "fantastic opportunities". Perhaps posting this question to HN
and undertaking some Twitter buzz if you can will attract the right sort of
people to your event more than career emails.

Anyway, good luck with the event! Great that these things even happen in the
UK, Rob

------
dcaunt
Have you contacted universities directly? I studied at the University of
Birmingham and they had a named contact for getting in touch with students.
That person often forwarded relevant communication (job opportunities,
recruitment events) to us and I took my first job based on one of those
emails.

I agree with robfitz that people don't talk about startups. The companies that
do the milkround are the usual suspects. Accenture, Deloitte, Procter and
Gamble etc...

~~~
ian
We've reached out to a ton of university career services and CS & engineering
departments. Some have been very helpful, for example the team at Queen Mary
have been amazing and probably 50% of their CS students are coming down. But
many of the others have been a lot less engaged and willing to promote to
their student body, vs the tried and tested options of banks & consultancies.

Do you think we should take the siliconmilkroundabout on tour? I'm wondering
if part of the issue is that we don't have our own stall alongside the usual
suspects you name.

~~~
dcaunt
That's great - shame on the others for not passing it on.

Clearly the big boys visit universities because they have the resources to do
so. If siliconmilkroundabout were to visit on behalf of a body of startups
this would clearly be more efficient than every startup trying to send one
man. I'd love to see this happen and I think it would have a huge impact on
students, especially given the contrast with other visitors. How it is funded
would be an issue and perhaps donors would see their company specifically
promoted but I think that can be worked out.

~~~
ian
I think we'll start looking into it. Should be possible. Maybe create a rota
scheme where a couple of founders staff each table which would allow us to hit
hundreds of milkround events over a year.

------
Hushpreet
A good discussion.

There are a variety of reasons as to why this occurs, particularly in the uk.
The most prominent is the lack of awareness of joining a start-up as an
achievable or even applicable career option.

NACUE, the business which I work on, encompasses a network of 40,000
enterprising students. And our biggest barrier is enabling students and grads
to understand that are different modes of being entrepreneurial post
graduation, and therefore 3 career options: 1\. Launching a company 2\. Being
entrepreneurial whilst working for one of the big boys - an intrapreneur 3\.
Joining a start-up team

The third has the greatest potential. Given the thriving start-up community in
London and others areas, and still, the record graduate unemployment.

We're working on raising the awareness of the above problem. Looking to launch
a programme next year - this can hopefully tie into the milkround.

Lastly, I don't think you need to be on campus. What we all need is to be
visible, and that is achieved through networks (i.e. ADCAS, EEUK) and online,
social media - that's where they're engaged.

I've promoted this across network - have a good one this weekend. Also, based
in Old Street if you want to share some ideas.

Hushpreet

------
helen842000
I've registered for the event this year but I graduated in '05 in CS/IS so I
guess I match the pattern you have been seeing.

When I graduated I barely knew that startups existed and I certainly didn't
know they needed grads.

I went to a Uni that had an associated business park and those companies
advertised on the student job board.

I did a graduate scheme with one of those companies but I wish I'd had more
exposure to startups and associated events.

Is there a central list of these 500+ roles? Not so people can apply but so
students know before hand that they are suited to the positions.

Maybe it's the nature of CS students, it's a pretty daunting time - especially
meeting recruiting companies face to face. It's hard to know what to say for
yourself if all you've got is a degree in hand.

For the average grads it feels like the competition would be just way to high.

With a few years of work experience it's much easier to go and chat to
recruiters as you've got confidence in the projects you've worked on.

I don't know if any of the roles at the event will be suited to me this Sunday
but I'm going anyway because I'd love to talk to some of the companies that
are there.

I don't think I would have done that as a grad.

~~~
ian
look forward to hopefully meeting you on sunday and would love any feedback
you have on how it goes for you.

I think the idea of a central list is a good one, and others have suggested
that too.

------
mattlivingston
Hi Ian, I'm a 2nd year CS student at the University of Bristol. Out of
everyone I know on the course, I'm the only one that regularly reads
HN/Techcrunch and has an interest in start-ups; it's also how I found out
about siliconmilkroundabout.

The start-up path isn't at all prominent here and I think there's a few
reasons for this: Lack of presence of start-ups at recruitment/careers fairs
(it's all the big names). The compulsory Hi-Tech units on the course aren't
done right - hours of lectures filled with slides rather than guest speakers
from start-ups, case studies, or any interactive processes whatsoever. Little
to no communication between start-ups and students (groups or individuals)
using social media or otherwise. Everyone sees messages posted on our CS FB
group but nobody really reads the emails sent through the CS HR.

I think your best bet is to communicate directly with Society heads (i.e.
students) such as Computer Science society or entrepreneurship society and to
organise some guest speaker events. Lastly I think it's really important for
students to know how they can help your start-up - specifically what skills
they would need and what they would learn as well.

------
n9com
Ian, I think it comes down to the fact that graduates here in London and the
rest of the UK aren't all that interested in startups as a whole. Having
studied at a top London uni and having friends doing CS degrees at Imperial,
UCL etc, none of them even considered joining a startup. It seems as though
all of these graduates have their heart set on joining investment
banking/trading - this is largely based on what they think the job is like,
but after they join, they realise it sucks but the money is pretty good they
just put up with it. This is based on 10+ of my friends working in banking and
hating the hours and the work.

We need to foster more of a startup culture within university campuses, right
now 99% of graduates don't even think about joining a startup - it just
doesn't even come into their mind, totally focused on joining a blue chip.

Finally, many (not all!) of the startups here in London don't even have a
proper business model and haven't made a profit despite being established for
years. So that doesn't exactly inspire confidence in the top CS graduates they
hope to attract.

------
adaml_623
I'll ask a question or three back at you. Why do you want graduates to work at
startups? Why do you think this is a desirable thing to champion?

I've just been looking at one of your companies
(<http://www.entrepreneurfirst.org.uk>) which has a free entreppreneurship
course for final year students and recent grads (2 years). And I have friend
who's been working for 3 years and was recently knocked back for a role
because she had passed the 2 year recent grad mark and was therefore
unsuitable.

So there seems to be a mindset that society must mold students in a certain
way and force them in certain directions perhaps before they are ready? And if
they take a few more years to become ready then they must now be treated
differently.

I guess my final question is, 'Are you sure that you're not making a mistake
by singleing out students'?

------
piers
It also might be worth getting in touch with Student Unions as some students
might have entrepreneur societies that have final years that would be
interested. As well as Math and Computer societies.

Generally I've found that the Unions might be more willing to spread the word
to the students than the universities.

~~~
ian
We've hit quite a few entrepreneur societies but not really student unions.
We'll look into that. Thanks.

------
SaintSal
No doubt the attraction of big companies is strong for grads, and for good
reasons. A positive observation is that post-grad Entrepreneurship programs
attract a lot of people who went straight to big companies and then figured
out that startups were a better option for them. So grads who get it just take
a year or 3 to become aware of the option.

I wonder if the answer lies with these recent alumni, and if there's a way to
share their experience with the doey-eyed undergrads job-seekers.

Maybe Milkroundabout needs to bring it into the schools, and enable alumni as
the awareness vector. Or maybe Milkroundabout could turn some attention to
rescuing former grads already employed at big companies, rather than focusing
solely on the newest grads.

~~~
ian
I think many of the current registrants (of which there are thousands) are
people who are 1-5 years into their career post uni and are realising they
maybe went in the wrong direction by joining a bank/microsoft etc. So we're
actually doing a good job of reaching that community.

I really like the idea of using alumni as an awareness vector.

------
jackgavigan
I think there's a couple of issues. First, there's probably a bias on the part
of graduates to take a job with what they perceive to be a safe, secure
company that will look good on their CV. I think that tendency is a cultural
thing here in the UK - there's more of a tendency for people here to work
_for_ companies for their entire career and, hence, there's traditionally been
a cachet attached to working for big companies. That's something that's likely
to change over time, though.

Another factor is likely to be a bias on the part of universities towards
building relationships with larger employers who are seen as prestigious. An
unheard-of startup won't garner anywhere near the interest and attention of a
large, well-known company.

------
mmahemoff
Are you working with uni staff to get the word out? Staff at programmes like
<http://www.ucl.ac.uk/msi/study/technology-entrepreneurship> would probably be
keen to promote it.

~~~
ian
We are, and have contacted a large number of list moderators for
careers/CS/entrepreneurship etc. I'll double check if we have reached out to
that one. Thanks

~~~
nickthedart
Nowadays unis get ranked partly on what % of their grads are in employment x
number of months after graduating, so its important to them to get graduates
placed in jobs. I've come across a Computer Science department having a
careers contact, who emails out vacancies to students. Maybe you might get
somewhere by contacting unis and trying to get these careers contacts?
(assuming a few of them do this?)

------
helipad
I was a business graduate (Nottingham) & we were never pitched startups
either.

I was very willing to join a startup, but I also tend to rail against the
Silicon Roundabout. I'm just personally not that interested in London.

Are many of these companies based elsewhere?

It's funny because something like this would do very well with Nottingham
students. The dedicated business campus also has many computer science
students, but we really only ever heard of the usual companies.

Have you looked at the Institute for Enterprise and Innovation on the
Nottingham Business Campus, for example?

~~~
ian
For this event, all the start-ups are London based, but there's no reason this
couldn't be replicated nicely at Nottingham and other emerging UK start-up
hubs

------
jamii
A pet hate of mine - the companies page just has a list of icons. Put a short
mission statement next to each so people don't have to click through to a
hundred different websites just to find out if they are interested.

~~~
ian
Good feedback. We are distributing a document to all who register with more
details on each company & their roles prior to the event.

------
sheremetyev
It would be interesting to have some feedback from startups as well. Have they
got many hires from the first fair? What kind of hires?

My intuition is that, on one hand, most graduates do not meet expectations of
startups. A startup needs exceptional people to push technology forward. On
the other hand, startups presented at the fair do not meet expectations of
potential employees. They are not "cool enough". (I registered for the event
in May but after looking at the list of companies decided that it was not
worth trouble going from Oxford to London.)

------
seandbarrett
Imperial College academic here. I haven't seen any fliers or posters around
college today so this might have something to do with your lack of uptake.
This is in contrast to the event you had earlier in the year which was
prominently advertised around the place.

Also I noticed there is a careers fair happening today, predominantly big
engineering firms/consultancies/banking, and I didn't see if you had any
representation there (apologies if you do and I missed it).

~~~
ian
Sean - thanks very much for stepping in and for the suggestions. We can send
some people along to the careers fair today but have also fliered over the
college. In general Imperial Careers have not been very responsive so perhaps
there's a CS focused liaison we should be talking to instead? Thanks

------
nickthedart
May sound weird, but don't forget the Job Centre. I got a previous job at a
startup via the Job Centre. My employers hadn't thought of advertising there
until Business Link or some entreprisey support place like that suggested it.
They've got a good job search facility. Don't think it costs anything to
advertise a job there. People mistakenly think people only go there to collect
dole but actually it is a place to look for a job too!

------
23r2f2r
Why focus on just CS and engineering degrees? I was a Physics student, knew
more about code than some CS undergrads and wasn't alone in that regard.
You'll also find a lot of generally smart people who you can teach to code
here.

I'll second the point many have made about money. It's hard to resist one of
the big banks offering you £40k+ straight out of university.

~~~
nickthedart
I probably sound like a broken record on HN, but this is surely a big part of
the problem - living costs in London. Even £40k doesn't give a great standard
of living in London, due to ridiculous accommodation and transport costs. I
think that startups should locate somewhere much cheaper but still attractive
to grads, somewhere north. Examples - Birmingham, Nottingham, Sheffield,
Leeds, Newcastle.

~~~
deathwarmedover
_> Even £40k doesn't give a great standard of living in London_

That all depends on your definition of "great standard of living". I started
out on £20k and have never felt that I was slumming it in London.

~~~
nickthedart
Fair point. My personal definition of a reasonable living standard, is being
able to save a house deposit and eventually buy a 2-up 2-down terraced house,
without forgoing all social life or basic no frills holidays. Such as house
costs £70-80k in a cheap part of a northern city, £120k in a more up-market
part, and, as for London, well maybe its under £300k on the very last stop on
a tube line - Morden for example. In London you're likely to end up in a
shared apartment for years. It might be a nice apartment, with good
housemates, but it'll never be yours, and what happens when you get married
and have kids? Lots of people answer "well then I move a 45 min train ride
away". My other definition of decent standard of living involves not paying
out thousands of £ to catch a stressful crowded train every day. ;)

------
will_hines
This event was advertised on campus at UCL, but not specifically within the CS
department. We received an email through JobOnline, but that's a service which
you have to sign up to.

I have just sent out an email to all students in the Computer Science
department; there were also flyers in the Engineering Cafe here which is the
main hub for technical students.

------
nicwest
as a vaguely recent graduate, and living in london, I was surprised that I
hadn't heard of this until I read it here on HN.

Also (and this is totally personal) the Brick Lane location would have put me
off a) because it's the other side of London, but mainly b) I have always
perceived brick lane (and there abouts) as a London counter-
culture/socialism/arty/etc scene, and events there abouts tend to follow that
stereo type (for example look at the difference between the New Designers
(<http://www.newdesigners.com/>) show and Free Range(<http://www.free-
range.org.uk/)>). I have no problem with that now, but straight out of uni I
was obsessed by money and one thing that a brick lane location doesn't scream
to the high heavens is just that: money...

------
All-ln
Hey,guys,I'm moving to London in a couple of weeks and would like to ask you
some questions about UCL/Imperial and the startup scene in general.Is there
some relevant forum(not studentroom.co.uk)? If not,due to lack of PM system on
YC,if any of you replies to my email anton_92@live.com,would appreciate
it.Thank you

------
randomhero2k
I have only just heard about this event and only because a friend sent me this
article on twitter. I have had a quick search but can't find any accounts for
this event on twitter. If you guys had an account you could send us details on
there then with one retweet, all my coursemates would know about it.

~~~
ian
We have set up a twitter about the event, and would love if you could help
retweet it to your coursemates. It's here:
<http://twitter.com/#!/milkroundabout>

Which university are you currently studying at, and outside of twitter, what
would have been the best way to help make you and your classmates aware of the
event?

~~~
randomhero2k
I have recently finished at Brighton university and so me and my mates are all
looking for jobs. Other companies in the past have got students to promote for
them, posting on the university intranet, facebook groups etc. I can't make
this event but I hope you do another.

------
ig1
It might be a good idea to organize a brainstorming event to figure out how to
attract more students/graduates to startups. When I worked in the financial
industry I was involved in running grad recruitment schemes, so I'd be happy
to chip in.

