The medium companies generally have a single true line of business and are focused on tuning & turning that crank, turning $3M/yr to $10-100M/yr. Doing something else makes you a trouble maker, and budgets are watched.

The bigger companies will have $100M-100B/yr revenue, so they'll do pretty insane engineering on the old product lines ("let's reimplement PHP with a modern VM!"), and take moonshots to enter new markets big enough to make a dent ("Let's give internet to everyone in Africa.") So both quality of life can be better and the projects can be more interesting and career defining.

So yeah, I'd go to bigco, or if a medco, one with enough ridiculous growth/funding to do insane things. But not a lot of years of your life that startups are easily doable, so I switched from R&D to startups, and can always go back later :)

A couple of more points to add:

1. There was a time when the pay distinction between working for big companies and small/mid was clear and present. But these days, the line is blurring.

BigCos have realized that startups are eating their lunch and hence they are investing heavily in new ideas and doing better engineering on the old ones to develop those markets even further, faster.

Smaller companies too have realized that they need to compete with the BigCos and hence have started to offer similar comps/perks. More and more of the VC funded fast-growing companies are offering packages competing with BigCos.

2. Hence, for a software engineer, the main reason to join/not-join a company today is less about pay. It's more about the type of work you will get to do, and the people that you want to work with.

3. There is something to be said about having a brand, but given how tech is percolating everything we do, it is also getting very differentiated. There are hence brands in every "flavor" of tech. e.g. if you want to work on self-driving cars, Waymo is a great brand. But if you want to work on healthcare tech, there are others.

I train software engineers to do better at challenging interviews and I do that for a living. The way I see it, the landscape has been shifting in this direction for at least past 5 years, if not more. At least in the large tech hubs of the US.

I would say that if a software engineer is optimizing for income maximization they should almost certainly join one of FAANG, unless they have a formidable appetite for risk and uncertainty. Consider some of the data compiled here: https://www.levels.fyi.

So, I can easily get breadth. I can also get depth if I want - embedded systems, etc.

In short, there are opportunities. It's up to you how you utilize them.

If you're talking about FAANG, which I assume you are, that's possibly true. But they aren't the only "big companies". There are tons of big cos which do not do any R&D (Cisco, Oracle and the like) and instead acquire startups to grow. And here's the kicker, they don't care for employee development; so choose wisely.

In general, because most technical startups are a wreck and otherwise have technical impedance mismatch with the acquirer, acquisitions likely have integration + technical expansion periods for the first few years before thy succeed/die.

Agreed with others: Opportunities are there, more about whether individuals go for them. And if you mean it doesn't just magically happen, yep. AFAICT, even at Google/FB/etc., PMs have to fight for who they get, and they probably fight for a lot of the same people, and the rest no one really knows...

Yes they are external entities, not part of Cisco. Cisco I believe calls them "spin-ins". They aren't Cisco employees though.

I've got friends who earn about what I do who are about my age who, many years, earn as much at this point from income on their capital as they do from their regular job. I would be in that position too, if I had spent my money working for a big company and socking cash away, rather than spending my '20s running a business.

I'd make more money working for other people, too. Having a company with a good brand on your resume means a hell of a lot more than running a lifestyle company, even if that company succeeded as a lifestyle company.

He said, To become an entrepreneur "One should work for small companies, generally in big companies, you are part of the big machine, but in small companies, you do most of the work your self and learn it".

So, it depends on what you want to be, if you plan to put your self in stable career without much of risk involved - go ahead with big companies.

If you want to be part of next future companies, where you can learn much more about the process of how company works and other information, start with smaller high growth company.

The only thing that will differ be efforts to sustain and keep rolling upwards for self and the company both in small company, while in big company, you will have primary focus on your self to keep up with the company.

I think this is only true when the startup is really small, say, 5-20 people. I was once part of a startup that had ~100 developers and I hardly learned about its inner workings, was rarely part of any decision-making on business or customer-facing use cases etc.

But "~100 developers" that you mentioned, can not be small or mid-tech companies, until half or more than half of the developers are useless.

100 developers in one company have potential to built the next billion dollar product and literally change the world.

As you can see, some one just mentioned, FB has 250 developers ( https://www.quora.com/How-many-software-engineers-work-at-Fa... ) and some people do have mentioned they have approx 700, 900, or ....

But, important factor is - they have only 25K employee (source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/273563/number-of-faceboo...) across world. There are more than 80+ office of Facebook world wide (source: https://www.facebook.com/careers/locations/), so even if you distribute employee evenly on all places - you will have approx 300 employees - each location.

My point is, if you were working in a company where 100 developers are creating product, than you were either at wrong place or judging the company wrong - one of them has to be true based on my research and opinion.

I do not want to offend any one with my post, I am just pointing the fact based on my research, please leave a reply, If my research above is wrong or misleading.

You linked to an answer with no source. Here's a revant post from the FB blog: https://www.facebook.com/notes/facebook-engineering/ship-ear...

But, a fresh exec or management track engineer? You could make a difference and climb the ladder.

It depends on where you are. Different folks need different opportunities.

On the other hand, if you end up on a bad team at a failing startup or midsize, you have to go through the entire interview process all over again. Going through that process can be a good experience, but eventually it gets old and you might be ready to spend 5 - 10 years at one gig making multiple year-long projects come to fruition. That's hard to do at a startup and even at midsize companies. It is much easier at FAANG and particularly Google.

Full disclosure: I recently accepted an offer at Google.

The interview process I think says a lot about a company. I was very put off by the processes of 2 of the big companies, so much so I'd never consider them again as I think it's a bit of an indication of how they operate in general.

I found smaller companies tend to have a much more honest conversation with you, and offer a lot of intangible benefits.

That said, if I were looking for money and benefits, the big ones are hard to beat.

Oops, forgot to answer the question. I work for a...smallish company now as I have for years, in a niche market. I appreciate the recognition I get, the freedom I'm afforded, no micromanagement, no stack ranking, etc. That's worth more to me than a larger salary, and having a known name on my resume at this point in my life.

I feel like there must be a lot of variance there --- what if the engineer(s) you were with are bad interviewers? What if it wsa a bad day? What if it was a bad time to interview?

One company, the process was a mess. The recruiter I worked with was fired in the process, which took a few days to sort out. It had many rounds of interviews, each expecting me to purchase material to study. One interview was absurdly bad, one of those 'well, that's not what it says on my paper' types. One interview the interviewer seemed almost condescending, asking questions with no possible one right answer.

Another company was much better in most regards, except when it came time for reimbursement. It was a bit 50/50 on whose fault it was, but it amounted to me being on the hook for a few hundred dollars. Not the end of the world, but I was sent a short rather cold message that made me feel like they thought I was trying to cheat them. I was trying to inquire about meeting me halfway, or what I could have done differently to avoid this, and never received a reply. As soon as I removed the flagged charges, it was paid and closed with no further communication. For a company who brags about perks and whatnot, the way they handled that turned me off. It was one of those 'notice how people treat people from who they have nothing to gain' moments. To add insult to injury, another group asked if I'd like to come back out. I replied rather short to that, which in retrospect I feel a little bad about.

That said, it is true I didn't work for those companies. But to me, a recruiter or interview process is a first impression. It's their face to me.

If I'm off base, though, I'd love to hear tales from others.

Edit to add - I will name one company that I really liked their interview...a company in Texas called Meteora. They were using tech way ahead of its time when I interviewed. They never asked me filter questions, or treated me like 'another applicant.' I talked to a competent engineer who explained what they did, what was needed, and their tech stack. I was honest in having no experience with this stack, and they were honest in telling me I wouldn't be a good fit. I wish all interviews were as simple.

Actually, typing this again made me a bit mad. It was Facebook, who spent the majority of my free day there showing me all the lavish offerings. I actually really liked the people there I met, well most of them. I was very upset by the message they had sent me. I am but a clueless guy from the midwest. They picked the hotel and said get a taxi. I asked the hotel if they'd help with a taxi, and they took care of it. How am I to know it's not a real taxi company?

Thanks for naming the company.

I pretty much quit half way because I haven’t seen such a disorganized interview process.

They probably get so many engineers wanting to work for them, I think they can afford to let things be broken. Kind of artificially restricting the funnel. Good for them I guess.

I purposely didn't want to name companies, I felt it's tacky since it's my personal opinion and view. If you'd like to discuss privately feel free to dm me.

http://danluu.com/startup-tradeoffs

A smaller startup / company can get things done faster, give you more experience in potentially more areas and more types of projects. If it's a high growth company it probably will make a fairly good resume item anyway.

The only caveat is that you have said: "who wants a corporate career" -- if by "corporate" you mean larger mega-companies, than of course, your choice should be Google.

Looks great on your resume, though.

*Note that I can't back this up with actual statistics. I'm just saying that I don't feel anywhere close to a graybeard elder at Google at age 45.

I definitely got that vibe 5+ years ago, but it's changed.

There is invaluable brand capital, and the network is priceless.

It’s the same rationale between choosing colleges.

I attended a top 14 university. I have instant respect and credibility.

I currently work for a massive global technology company. I have instant respect and credibility.

Do I ask for it? No. Is it warranted more than the next guy? I don’t think so.

If you work for a smaller company, with a smaller name, you are limiting the network you can leverage, in size and industry.

Brand capital. Signaling. Status. It’s a game, and there are gatekeepers. And it all depends on how you want to play it.

Doesn’t matter what I studied at college. I went to a good college. People think I’m smart.

Doesn’t matter what my position is. I work for a reputable global company. People think I’m successful.

I would recommend putting the work in and playing the game early in your career before you jump to smaller ventures, and take risks working at companies with limited track records and speculative futures.

I scour LinkedIn and pay attention to the work histories of people I respect and admire, and have achieved the success I desire.

There is a pattern.

Getting closer by choosing a smaller employer that's remote flexible.

I go to college and work full time.

Some have been short - 4 month contract at SAS, six months at NG. It's worked out though. Liked every job more than the previous.

Barring that, I prefer a Google/Microsoft/etc big 5 company.

I don't personally feel like there's a lot of draw to a low level position at mid-sized companies, and I've worked at a few. You're going to sacrifice the personal agency you get as soon as you go above, say, 10-15 engineers. So if you're going to do that, you might as well go all the way and get the massive paychecks, benefits, valuable stock, fringe benefits, and the in-place infrastructure.

If I were looking for positions higher up the chain (CTO, Director, etc), then mid sized companies start to look more interesting because you have the opportunity to have that impact with a big team and product that's already in place.

“Do you want to be somebody, or do something?”

You will be a really big deal at FANG but you are not likely to do as interesting work as you would in a smaller mildly successful company.

https://www.amazon.com/Boyd-Fighter-Pilot-Who-Changed/dp/031...

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Boyd_(military_strategi...

What are your competencies and how do they mesh with the requirements of the employer?

There are a lot of competent programmers who would never get employed by Google and there are many brilliant engineers at Google who would struggle in a GSD focused small company.

In a big company, most risk has been removed from the equation. This is great for compensation and stability but also limits ones possible learnings as well. You might find your time learning the big company’s systems which don’t apply universally because they’re specific to that company’s needs.

In smaller companies, risk is still a real aspect of life. The downsides are obvious but the joys are that you’re closer to the customer and your actions have real impact. I find these types of learnings to be universal which is why I’m drawn to it.

One aspect that I’d like to put words to is something orthogonal to the opportunities, which is the distance of the opportunity from the customer and a ‘real’ problem. This isn’t always true in big companies but at most you’d feel like a cog in the machine no?

After some years of that, consider switching sides and find a company that builds its own products, whatever they are.

* Higher total compensation (after negotiating!) - though salary + bonus were competitive the additional equity really pushed the offer up and it's less ephemeral than younger companies

* 50% 401k matching basically adds +$9k to the offer and fits right into my financial goals

* Promotion potential; growing into a senior role is (mostly) defined and commensurately compensated

There are also a few other financial perks that Google enables me to take advantage of that further sweetened the deal and were aligned with my financial goals. There were many trade-offs made, but this overall aligned best with my long-term goals.

The other factor to consider is quality of life. How many hours and what types of stress will the bigco job have versus the younger company? I joined the younger company first and I don't think a single person works 40 hours and the environment is relaxed, the CEO/founders are awesome! The pay is good, but it's not Google levels, but there is opportunity to increase that. We are quite profitable already. I can try for a bigco job another day, in fact any day or not. However, for now, because of my life situation, I chose the smaller company.

Don't waste your time with a startup or as cofounder (nothing else is good).

I would never have considered doing anything with Microsoft in the late 1990s.

Likewise, I would never consider doing anything with google now.