1. Job security is not a reason to stay in a corporate job.

Before I joined the startup world I worked in commercial banking for 7 years. The last 3 years at the bank I was thinking about joining a startup. It took me a long time to make the leap. Making the change seemed risky and scary. In hindsight that was dumb and I should have made the change sooner. Here is what I’ve learned:

One of the reasons I hesitated leaving was a sense of job security that I had at the bank. Looking back now that sense of job security was BS. Once you’ve tasted the corporate world and its dress requirements and cubicles anything different from that world seems risky and wild. At our panel in SXSW last month, Shamir Karkal, CFO at BankSimple said, “I think more banks have failed in the past 3 years than startups.” I think he’s right. The truth is that if you gain some basic necessary skills and want it bad enough there will always be a startup somewhere that needs you.

2. Startups are more fun, and you can change the world.

If you are working at a healthy startup that is disrupting something, you are likely constantly doing stuff that you have never done before. At FeeFighters, we are trying to create transparency in an industry that for 30+ years has been intentionally opaque and difficult to understand. We are making a difference and our small business customers love us. Opening customer feedback email is a joy, something that I couldn’t always say in my corporate gig. Some days it can seem overwhelming, but the work itself is always way more fun than the repetitive nature of the corporate world.

3. The work you do at startup has a much bigger impact on the business itself.

If I had a huge year at the commercial bank, it had zero affect on the bank’s earnings. When you do something great at an early stage startup, the effect is immediate. You can see your impact right away. Winning a new customer when the bank already has 100,000 customers seems kind of lame. Winning a new customer when you only have 5 customers is an awesome feeling. You can only get that feeling at a startup.

4. Startups are more meritocratic than the corporate world.

This may seem obvious, but its great to actually experience it. The best idea almost always wins at a startup. There are less politics and red tape to get in the way. If you have a good idea and pitch it to the team at a startup, there is a great chance that it will be implemented. On the flipside, if you have a bad idea, your teammates will tell you why its bad and often come up with a better idea. Waking up everyday knowing that only the best ideas will be implemented makes you feel proud about the work your doing.

5. If you join an early stage startup, you could become very rich.

Early stage employees often get a significant amount of equity ownership. If you and your colleagues figure out how to make the business work, that equity value can grow very quickly. Granted a large exit is a long shot and a lot of startups do fail, but at least you have a shot to make it big. To build your net worth in the corporate world you often have to grind it out for decades. There is also a relatively low ceiling to how much you can make. In the startup world, there is no ceiling and it can happen way faster. Getting rich might not be what drives you everyday, but the possibility that it could happen is always fun to think about.

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