Why would anyone think that the average entrepreneur or even early startup person would be able to seamlessly transition back and forth between the entrepreneurial and big corporate worlds, at least at the lower levels relevant here. It's a different mindset and skillset. And it works both ways, you'd expect startups to be biased against salarymen.
> And it works both ways, you'd expect startups to be biased against salarymen.
Not without good reason.
I have been on that side of the table. I have recruited my fair share of salarymen.
To be fair, some don't make it past the interview table. I'm not joking. "Where's my office ?" is a question I have been asked. Seriously !
The majority of the time it ends up being a dreadful mistake.
The truth is the corporate guys are too used to be hiding in numbers.
In the corporate world you are one of a team. You can ask your team members for help. You can push tasks you don't want off onto your junior team members. All luxuries you don't get in the small business world.
And, sadly, if you are largely useless, in a corporate world, as long as you keep your head down, you can float around as dead-wood until someone gets round to firing you, usually a decade or so later by the time the your manager has passed it up to HR and HR has got round to it ...
There's no room for dead wood in small business.
And of course in the technology sphere, in the corporate world you get to play with bigger budgets. The hardware vendors take you out to lunch. You get "enterprise support". You don't get any of that in the small business world.
Don't get me wrong, I have had some good ex-corporate recruits, but the majority of time its been an expensive mistake. Which is why I tend favour SME recruits overall.
As someone who has done exactly that, I'll tell you why: because we know what's expected of employees. The people who start businesses are generally high performers. When I hired others, I naively expected them to approach their work in the same way I do. The reality is most people suck. They feel the best when they finish a shift having done the least, as though they got away with something. I feel the best when I get the most done.
Many of the best entrepreneurs can (and do) excel greatly within corporate environments. They’ve learned how to lead, sell, and get things done even when they have to improvise.
The problem is that “ex-entrepreneur” is a title that anyone can give themselves by merely registering a domain name and a business one evening. The title attracts a lot of people who have no business being an entrepreneur or leading people, but want to be in charge of people and running the show.
That latter group is the long tail, and due to the inevitable failure of their startups those people are far more likely to be seeking jobs than the ex-entrepreneurs you want working for your company.
Having spent some time in local startup and entrepreneur communities, I have no problem believing that the average person who self describes as an ex-entrepreneur would make for a below-average employee. A lot of these people want to be in charge and tell others what to do more than they want to do the work, which is the opposite of what you’re looking for in people to work for your company.
Because outside of the rare entrepreneurs who make 50k a month working 5 hours a week, there are a lot who worked 90 hour weeks sometimes not even being able to pay themselves. Yes maybe at one point they wanted to wear many hats and venture out. But that isn't a sustainable lifestyle for everyone. To think that person couldn't develop an appreciation for a supportive environment with PTO, the ability to focus on a limited number of tasks, stable pay, stable work hours and other team members they can depend on is a very limited viewpoint imo.
