How to gauge good people to work for in Indian startups?

Just a curious question, I like the idea of working for startups and building new teams, I am seeing massive layoffs and toxic culture news around , any good bets in-terms of work culture?

After going through so many posts on grapevine..I feel like all the startups in India are toxic only 😕😕 Really want to know which are the startups worthy of joining? Preferably in product roles

Last month I interviewed with NoBroker for a Demand Servicing Head position. The process went like this: 2 rounds of screening with HR/TA - was okay, good conversations. After which they scheduled an interview with the Business Head for the particular team. This interview went well too. After this they sent me an assignment - the longest assignment I've ever worked on as a part of the recruitment process. It asked me to write multiple detailed SOPs for the sales team, build a demand forecast model, and a complete demand generation plan for an oddly specific scenario. They gave me 5 days for it. I worked my a** off, desperate to get the job as I've been unemployed for some time. I did the assignment close to perfection - spoke to so many industry folks in real estate and made realistic assumptions, covering all possibilities. All in all I've not been so confident about my work ever like I was in this case. I submit and they acknowledge. Few days go by, I follow up, only to be given generic delay reasons by HR. Eventually, after more than a week they rejected me. When I requested for feedback on the assignment they completely ghosted me. I don't know why I'm sharing this here, but it's been hard. I've been jobless for > 5 months and every such experience completely shatters my already low self esteem further.

I am a 6 yrs experienced Software developer and part of a mid-stage startup. This is my third job; I have been working here for 3 years. I was involved here as one of the core engineers at the start in developing the overall platform, After that, my growth as an engineer stagnated for 2 years . Constant importance and priority are given to business requirements and hacky work getting pushed to production in the name of fast iterations and business impact every week. My engineering manager lacks proper engineering skills and doesn't respect engineers even after their impact on the company and constantly keeps saying the engineering team doesn't contribute to the revenue of the company despite us pushing work that improves business positively. Last year around November, around 80% of the engineering team was subtly suggested to start looking out for work (basically a soft layoff) because management was too scared of a social media backlash Due to all this,2 years' worth of technical debt has accumulated on the overall codebase and apart from giving justification for every code improvement that we try to make there, we still have to work on business/product requirements. My growth as an engineer has stopped and I am worried about missing out on the latest developments in the tech industry, especially with AI in the picture, and want to make my skillset somewhat AI-proof. I have come back to hands-on coding this year , so that's a positive start. I am considering taking a 3-4 month break after resigning from my company to study, develop side projects, develop a portfolio etc Has anyone else been in this boat ? How did you come out strong?

I go through multiple posts every day. Every one is cursing their company. The bosses are bad. Managers suck. Company is fraud. Is it always the company, managers , bosses at fault. How can we create better work environment in Indian Startup’s.?

Can anyone share for the benefit of those who are keen to avoid making mistakes..

Startup ecosystem seems to be going through a tough time recently. with less money infused in the market, and all the big player laying off employees, companies stooping so low in the name of cutting down the cost and news about some companies treating their employees like shit. Still my optimistic ass believes that it can’t all be that bad, right? and things might get better. Here’s my question to the community, what are some companies you would like to work for and why(apart from money 😉)?

Hello all! I am working as HR Head in a growth stage startup in Bangalore. So many people here talk about compensation, culture, growth etc. Happy to answer questions related to HR/Culture/Startups.