from Hacker News

Why Entrepreneurs Hate Working at Big Companies

by trevor99 on 4/17/13, 10:43 PM with 49 comments

by blackhole on 4/17/13, 11:57 PM
This article has the right idea, but is obsessed with money. Money is not the fundamental motivator for all entrepreneurs. There are plenty of people who would rather work for themselves and barely be able to pay rent for the rest of their lives rather than work for a large company simply because they will be more happy doing what they love and barely managing to feed themselves than they will doing something they hate and having all the money they ever wanted. They don't care about the money, they care about doing what they love to do. So long as they can feed themselves and find a roof to sleep under, being able to work on something they love to do will trump everything else.
by nichodges on 4/17/13, 11:21 PM
As someone in a 'big company', I'm often frustrated (although not surprise) that entrepreneurs seem to see this is a binary problem.
This piece did touch on the real issue startup founders have with big companies - but only touched on it.
The issue is not compensation, the issue is an inability to understand how to traverse the system in order to execute and achieve what you want (and that can include 10x returns).
This ability is about understanding how to identify the problems/opportunities within a business that need to be addressed that nobody is attending to. This ability has nothing to do with office politics.
I've seen several people who have managed this. In fact I've seen 5x more people achieve amazing things in big organisations than I have seen entrepreneurs truly succeed. People within big organisations can also make it a non-binary choice - working with and often working on companies outside their 'big company' (I spend ~1 day a week working/advising some amazing startups as part of my job).
The inability to execute in a big company may not simply be due to oversight by entrepreneurs - it may be that the type of person that is successful at one cannot be successful at the other. But I don't believe that's true all of the time, and I find it shortsighted that so many successful entrepreneurs seem to see it as the truth.
by guylhem on 4/17/13, 11:30 PM
It is that simple : if I really trust my idea to be so good, why waste my time with a system that will at best not fight against my idea, and will not let me reap the full benefits of it? If I success, I'd rather keep everything (or most of it!) for myself!
There is a very small subset of problems, where, needing some very specific resources for my project, it is more logical to seek them from within an existing corporation, ie joining it, than from myself or the market.
I could live with the idea of japanese-style corporation, where loyalty goes both ways. It would be logical then to accept the idea of sharing in a system where others will share with you. Unless you have some serious deadweight, sharing would reduce the variance of your profits, but not the mean.
But if employees are resources to be used and discarded, companies are likewise resources to be used and discarded.
Basically, if the social contract is uphold, it is logical to share with others, knowing they will too share with you.
For a game theory analogy, when one breaks one's word, cooperation is no longer the best strategy, but defection.
The rise of entrepreneurship may have some link with the end of the traditional corporation, where one had a job until retirement, put a real effort in it, and was appropriately compensated.
by AndrewKemendo on 4/18/13, 2:10 AM
I disagree with most of this because I don't think it is about money, but this part in particular underplays what in my mind is the largest reason entrepreneurs cannot stand large organizations:
>Corporate politics and bureaucracy are just another obstacle that can be learned and overcome
You can learn to navigate politics and bureaucracy, but you can't overcome them without becoming management - in which case your hands are generally bound to the same metrics that your previous bosses were as well.
If it takes 4 levels of review just to see if my project can be begun or to build a team to begin even MVP development, I don't want to be near that. It's too slow, access to resources, if available, are so tightly scrutinized that if there is any failure you can kiss future chances goodbye, attaching new hardware or software is a nightmare because the systems need to all be compatible on this network etc.. etc.. all make the large corporately integrated system terrible for the fast paced error>revise>error>revise cycle that entrepreneurs want.
This is why the Valve model of flat organization is so appealing to many and spoken about in terms like "future of the workplace."
by trustfundbaby on 4/17/13, 11:15 PM
Enterprise companies are built in a way that slows the process of getting shit done to an absolute crawl (red tape, politics, approvals, process and god-knows-what other nonsense that somebody in a position of authority has decided they're going to throw at you that afternoon), and that kind of environment is simply noxious to the kind of person that has the audacity to think they can start from nothing and build a company that employs hundred(s) and pulls in millions in just a few years.
It really is that simple. You can even find some small companies that entrepreneurs wouldn't last a second in, because they have this same mindset.
The point at any company where getting things done becomes less important than making sure people (and by induction, the company) follow orders or don't screw up, is the point at which entrepreneurial minded folks can no longer thrive at said company.
by phillmv on 4/18/13, 12:19 AM
>The answer is compensation. Not that big companies don’t compensate them enough, but that the compensation structure is not aligned with an entrepreneur’s world view.
As far as I can tell the dominating decision factor for everyone I know who runs their own company seems to be "freedom from management". That's why people work for years at an expected value of a below-market wage. That's why people leave a year into their four year vesting schedule post-acquisition.
In the anglo corporate culture there is little to no room for co-determination; and I would wager that's especially grating to those in the position to do something about it.
by DigitalSea on 4/17/13, 11:36 PM
The problem with a lot of bigger companies is instead of nurturing and encouraging their workers to think outside of the box, they keep them as sterile as possible through contract clauses that prohibit their employees from working on any idea that is even remotely close to the companies particular niche (some even prevent you from personal projects full-stop) and non-compete agreements when they leave preventing them from finally being able to chase their entrepreneurial dreams.
Larger companies only innovate when their competitors do, they have obligations to meet (stockholders, customers, management executives) and doing anything different or trying anything new is a risk that could jeopardise profits of a company. Entrepreneurs who start out with nothing really don't have as much to lose as a company does, two different paths and ways of thinking.
by davidroberts on 4/17/13, 11:09 PM
I think it's because they have a dream, and know that if they tried to accomplish that dream in a big corporation, they'd have to sell it to people at multiple levels of bureaucracy whose job description often includes killing dreams. Even if it was accepted, it would no longer be their dream, it would be the corporation's dream, under corporate control and ultimately susceptible to being morphed into something totally unrecognizable or killed at the corporate whim.
Entrepreneurs feel to their bones that their dreams are too great a part of themselves to so totally put under other people's control. And they don't believe anybody but themselves can truly understand their dream or pull it off.
by marssaxman on 4/17/13, 11:10 PM
Working at big companies sucks for many reasons which have nothing to do with compensation. Many people might prefer to work in a less constraining environment regardless of the pay.
The author appears to have a strange definition of "entrepreneur" which is some kind of personality trait and not a business role. I suppose he must be using the word "entrepreneur" as shorthand for "person with high tolerance for the risks involved in starting a new business", i.e. a potential entrepreneur.
by jmilinion on 4/18/13, 12:42 AM
I disagree. Many entrepreneurs would love to work for a big company IF they were at the controls and not the cogs.
Steve Jobs. He had full control over Apple and could tell it to build whatever he wanted. He worked for a big company. From what I've read, he was happy working there.
Larry Page and Sergey Brin, they seem happy working for a big company.
Larry Ellison loves working for Oracle. I have yet to hear any disappointment from him about working for a big company.
All in all, I think many entrepreneurs would love working at big companies - as long as they are in the top 1% of the company who have control over the rest.
by pesenti on 4/18/13, 12:43 AM
I am an entrepreneur. And I now work in a big company. It has been 10 months since they acquired my company. As far as I am concerned this article is completely inaccurate. I don't give a damn about compensation. IBM gave me enough money for my kids to retire - I don't need more money from them.
It's not easy though. My number one issue is inefficiency. My number two is politics. But I wish I could make it work as within a company like IBM I have the potential to do things that I couldn't have dreamt to do in my own company.
by 7Figures2Commas on 4/18/13, 1:41 AM
It's naive to make blanket statements about entrepreneurs. "Entrepreneurs" are not a homogenous group. It appears the author believes that entrepreneurs generally are overconfident, find insolvency to be an acceptable outcome so long as they have a lottery ticket in hand, and fashion themselves as arbitrageurs.
First, it's worth pointing out that arbitrageurs seek to exploit opportunities that are, in theory, risk free. So to suggest that entrepreneurs are looking to "arbitrage the system" while at the same time shooting for the stars when the odds are "slim" is a curious and entirely inconsistent argument.
That notwithstanding, if you look beyond a small group of 20-something entrepreneurs in the Bay Area, you'll find plenty of people who have started businesses who worked at mid-sized and large companies for years. For some, the knowledge and experience gained allowed them to spot the opportunity they're pursuing. For many, the relationships established and good money earned during those years of service put them in a position to pursue the opportunity with far less risk than they would have taken on if they tried to start a company before they had domain expertise, a professional network and financial resources of their own.
It's sad to see folks reduce entrepreneurship to short-sighted risk-taking by individuals who somehow can't or won't function in an organization that isn't their own. Smart entrepreneurs take calculated risks, start businesses in industries they know and don't begin their journeys with a few thousand dollars in the bank.
by technotony on 4/17/13, 10:47 PM
Best quote: It’s because they perceive the best case scenario as being a waste of time. They see a better opportunity outside the system.
by xijuan on 4/18/13, 1:04 AM
This article makes me think there are only two kinds of people: entrepreneurs and non-entrepreneurs. And all entrepreneurs hate work at big companies... You see the problem? The article didn't recognize that there are variations about entrepreneurs and there are variations among big companies.
by noonespecial on 4/18/13, 3:39 AM
No feeling in the world is worse for an entrepreneurialy minded person than seeing a severe problem, knowing how to fix it to the point of demonstrating the solution, but being forbidden from doing so because of trivial politics.
You will find this by the dump-truck full at BigCo.
by gz5 on 4/18/13, 1:39 AM
Insane determination when you are building a dream does not always map into insane determination when [whatever you are asked to do in big company].
Consider that many entrepreneurs grow out of even their own company - their own baby - when it moves from startup phases to an x year old mature company.
by fellowniusmonk on 4/18/13, 1:15 AM
I think the biggest issue for me is the fact that I have to work with people who should have been fired a long time ago instead of some co-founders that know how to execute. Working at a company that has never had a lean year can be very frustrating, people can have little motivation outside of CYA and a paycheck, it's the lack of desire to build something focused and exciting and to push back against bad ideas. This is not every large corporation, but it is many.
by EugeneOZ on 4/18/13, 3:01 PM
Word "Enterpreneurs" should be replaced to "author of this post".
by michaelochurch on 4/18/13, 2:48 AM
Way off the mark. It's not about compensation (if you succeed, VCs will tear you to shreds via multiple liquidation preferences and horrible terms). It's about autonomy and career development.
Working at a big company makes sense if you can get allocated to a great project, and it's hard to tell from outside what the good projects are. Otherwise, you have to deal with red tape and approvals and resource requests and headcount issues that will eat your soul and turn you just as lazy as the middle managers who create such processes (who do so because they've become demoralized and lazy and realize that dysfunctional bureaucracy, like undocumented code, provides job security).
by clobber on 4/17/13, 11:33 PM
The word "entrepreneur" is getting used as a blanket term way too much to the point that anyone with an idea, CRUD app or working at a startup is an "entrepreneur."
by paulhauggis on 4/18/13, 2:16 AM
I've worked at small to mid-level sized companies my whole adult life (I'm quitting in two weeks to work on my business full-time).
Working at any company always starts out well. I have so many ideas, thoughts, and energy I want to put into my position. For me, it always fades after about 6 months.
The politics, managers, ridiculous ideas that I'm forced develop, long hours that could have easily been prevented with better practices usually ruin it for me.