Biggest dilemma of my life

I am working in a Pre Seed GenAI Startup (2020 Founded) as Head of Engineering (Team of 20 with 5-6 in Engineering, No CTO) It's been 3.5 years (3yrs Full Time + 6mon Internship) Previously it is in EdTech now in GenAI Space My CTC is 8 LPA + 0.45% ESOPs (10-12L in 25cr valuation). Skills: Nodejs, Nextjs, Monorepos, MongoDB, AWS, Serverless 1-2yrs ago we were thinking about scaling the tech team, etc but then that EdTech model started failing and then we went to a war time after that we pivoted currently also we are burning money revenue is there but very less (25% of the expense) I was of the view that I want to lead teams and scale products That's why I was there in the team It can be the case tomorrow if we scale but Now I am confused whether I should switch my job and or stick with the startup maybe the startup grow tomorrow or a big VC fund us to scale (as I have ESOPs) or it will just be a waste of time or opportunity cost Please guide 🙏 Anyone with a similar startup experience would really appreciate your help 🙏

I am sure alot of you are living away from your family. Wanted to know how do you take care of your parents and their expectations and at the same time fulfilling your career ambitions? Sharing my personal story here. I come from a small town in Rajasthan and I belong to a upper middle class Jain family. With God’s grace, we are comfortable financially with a sizeable ancestral wealth. My father is 58 and is getting weak and old with time. He wants me to comeback and take care of the family business and properties. He fears that if the transition is not made quickly then my uncle’s family will take over my share. (My uncle is very well connected politically in my hometown) But at the same time, I am not interested in taking over the business as of now and want to explore more in the field of tech and startups while living in different cities in Indian and abroad. I am now in a dilemma as to what is the right path moving forward and how do I balance my individual aspirations with my family responsibilities? I am sure alot of you must have faced the similar issues and I am seeking your advice or experience in handling such problems.

Hi, I am a 2023 passout btech graduate. Currently I am working as a full time SDE (Full Stack) in a well established startup (8 years old , Series A funded). It's been nearly half year here. My compensation is 10.5 lakh base + 4.5 lakh performance bonus + free lunch and snacks + Insurance (Including parents) benefits I am pretty good at DSA (around 2000 rating on leetcode, 4 Star at codechef in 2nd year itself, 2000+ dsa problems) I have worked in 2 startups as an SDE intern during college days and completed 5 internships overall out of which one was a US based startup. Also, I have many publications under my name over the internet. I had many offers when I was graduating from college. Most of the time people say, "Hey, you have done so much so Why are you not working in a big tech". Well I always wanted to work for big tech during college days but after I started working in startups my thought process changed as here I got the ownership of the product. Now it has been nearly 1 year since I started working in startups. Should I give it a try for big tech now? Would like to hear your views guys

I have 2 job offers in hand and now am a bit confused. Need your advice on decision-making, 1st offer - Jaipur location - investing and trading company, offering me an Equity Research Analyst role with a profit-sharing in the new business division which they are developing. 2nd offer - Bangalore-based startup, recently raised $550k, has 18 months of runway, the current scale is low.. they are offering me mixed roles - 50% of the time will go into Social Media and Content, 30% in Business and 20% in Finance. ESOPs will be based on 6-8 months of performance. Now I have 2 career paths in mind: 1) I want to do CFA and get into the core finance side... it might also lead me to the VC, PE, or IB side. 2) Startup - I have done startup in the past but failed. I want to do startup again but currently want to join a good startup where I can learn from experienced people. I don't know how I should go about deciding b/w these 2 career paths. If you were in my shoes, how would you make a decision?

Ask me anything! I work in engineering and I’m happy to answer any questions you might have on what it’s like to work in a startup.

I am Interning at a very early stage startup in the Growth Team. My stipend is ₹15,000 p/m and the work is decent - community mgmt, content, product gamification & market research. It’s a pre-seed startup so sometimes I feel lack of resources are putting a cap on my abilities to execute. Though, the founder has assured that we’re close to raising pre seed. I am pretty good friends with the Founder and I’ve met him a few times. Now, coming to the main part of problem - I casually applied for an Internship in a early stage startup but the team is sorted. They have funds and their founding team is super experienced. Stipend offered is 2x of what I’m getting. I was wondering If I should opt for that? Or, keep my head down and work for the same startup, ignoring the money aspect? Pls lmk folks.

I am a student doing my internship at a startup in Bangalore. I get paid very less. I want to join a product based company. I didn't do much of either competitive programming or DSA. Currently i am learning DSA and planning to start Competitive programming to crack product companies. But i am confused is this right or should I follow some other paths?? Can anyone help me with this🥲

I am 34, BU Head at mid size startup, 1Cr+ CTC and 3Cr ESOP. Tier 1 MBA+Engg. Still 5yrs away from financial freedom. Startup founders who have taken similar jump what would say? Was it worth it? If yes, any tips on finding start up ideas.

Im working as a developer in a unicorn startup with good salary for my age. But from college time I was interested in entrepreneurship trying different thing and later after completing college I joined this unicorn and worked hard, shifted to their new stealth startup and worked there with for 1yr, tried to work in every possible opportunity that I got with design team, product managers and learnt how to build a startup from scratch, but later due to creative issues in top level management and less revenue than the competitors the startup was shutdown and I was moved back to the unicorn and again started working as an developer. Tried different things from then 1. Tried joining top B schools but couldn’t afford 2. Tired pitching ideas to friends, seems like no one interested in taking risk leaving the life they have now 3. Tried starting few things on my own but always end up failing with no support 4. Tried attending conferences but that too never led me anywhere Now don’t have as many friends interested in entrepreneurship or mentors to guide me. Just passing the days doing the same work again and again please suggest me what to do next or give me any kind of advice

Hey everyone, I'm currently working as a SDE at a startup with about three years of experience. I'm considering making a move, and I've received an offer from an early-stage startup where I'd be joining as a founding engineer. My main motivation for wanting to switch to some startup is the potential for high learning and growth opportunities, especially since I'm still relatively early in my career. However, I'm a bit torn between targeting multinational corporations (MNCs) like FAANG and sticking with startups.On one hand, MNCs offer more stability and potentially valuable stock options, which can be more than just paper money. So, my question is, should I prioritize learning and growth by staying with startups, or should I also consider the FAANG tag and potential stock benefits? Also Would there be any added advantage when I later interview at some FAANG , after working as a founding engineer for 3-4 years in some startup (given I’ll have to build multiple things from scratch and owning multiple modules). The base package for the offer I hold is roughly equivalent to what FAANGs pay at my level. Any advice or insights would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!