Shouldn't just be a question for post-failure, but any sort of post-startup job. I've bounced back and forth between startups and bigCo my entire career. Or as I like to call it, moments of stark frenzied terror sandwiched between years of immense boredom.
One thing being in a small startup teaches is versatility, you can vastly expand the breadth of your skillset in an environment where you have to perform, even if some of your core skills languish a bit.
It's hard to get this across in a resume, but do put them down. Are you a coder than ended up spending a few hours a week on sales? Put it down. Marketing guy who got roped into server administration? Put it down.
When applying for a place, just simply reorder those various hats you wore in your old startup to suit the position you are applying for. Put the most relevant ones at the top of the list and the least relevant ones nearer the bottom.
It can definitely take some getting used to, going back to working for somebody else, you feel like you've lost lots of autonomy -- you might even have to take what feels like a couple steps back. But you can turn that on its head and use your broad skillset to quickly move up the ranks. You can do the job they hired you for and, oh yeah, you can do these other half dozen jobs competently, should you just be in charge of the whole group then since you know what everybody does and can reach across and down as needed?
also get used to befuddling even competent recruiters, at one startup I did almost every job in the place at one time or another, when looking for a new job it drove the recruiters crazy trying to place me
also get used to befuddling even competent recruiters, at one startup I did almost every job in the place at one time or another, when looking for a new job it drove the recruiters crazy trying to place me
I had this problem - recruiters want a job title to pigeon hole you with. Their brains explode when they can't do this.
One thing being in a small startup teaches is versatility, you can vastly expand the breadth of your skillset in an environment where you have to perform, even if some of your core skills languish a bit.
It's hard to get this across in a resume, but do put them down. Are you a coder than ended up spending a few hours a week on sales? Put it down. Marketing guy who got roped into server administration? Put it down.
When applying for a place, just simply reorder those various hats you wore in your old startup to suit the position you are applying for. Put the most relevant ones at the top of the list and the least relevant ones nearer the bottom.
It can definitely take some getting used to, going back to working for somebody else, you feel like you've lost lots of autonomy -- you might even have to take what feels like a couple steps back. But you can turn that on its head and use your broad skillset to quickly move up the ranks. You can do the job they hired you for and, oh yeah, you can do these other half dozen jobs competently, should you just be in charge of the whole group then since you know what everybody does and can reach across and down as needed?
also get used to befuddling even competent recruiters, at one startup I did almost every job in the place at one time or another, when looking for a new job it drove the recruiters crazy trying to place me