What I learned from working at a fortune 500 company, a mid-size company and a start-up.

Recently, I met an old friend from college over coffee. She was really curious to know, what I was up to these days as I had earlier mentioned that I was working for a startup.

Ten minutes into the conversation, the topic came up again and I started explaining how and why I moved from working for a fortune 500 company to a mom-and-pop business to now a startup or more precisely a startup accelerator. Although I managed to give her a reasonable explanation at the time, the question has been on a loop in my mind since then, so I had promised myself that I will think through it and document my observations. So here it is, hope you enjoy the ride as much as I did.

I think my experience can be best understood by an analogy of travelling by a train, a plane and a rocketship. Let’s take it piece by piece and understand how this analogy makes sense.

First the Train. Trains are huge and so are fortune 500 companies. There are too many people around, many of whom are on it not for the entire journey, but stop out at some MBA/M.tech/MS station midway. Many might change trains to get to where they want.

Second the Plane. The plane is smaller, there are lesser people around and although all the people might not be committed to travel end to end with the plane, but once the plane has taken off for Chicago from New-York, you can be sure that you and the person next to you are on it together for at least that part of the journey.

Third Rocketships. People on rocketships are on a mission- they are together in it for nothing but that mission. It’s this mission that drives all their intentions and their actions. You can trust the person sitting next to you as long as the mission is in sight. And even long after the mission has been accomplished, you form relationships that last for life.

I do not have anything against how trains and planes work. In fact, they are good enough for what they are meant to do. But, if all you have got is one life to find what you are absolutely the best, at doing, to work with people who you can trust for a job as much as you trust yourself (and sometimes even more), to live a life of greatness, a life of meaning and life of purpose, then I would work for nothing but a startup and board nothing but a Rocketship for the journey of my life.

Regards,

Traveler