Indian Startup
Abhishek Sarkar
What is a startup?
Well let me first start this by defining what a start up
is. Startup according to me is the most abused and misunderstood word. Every
company wants to be called a startup, just because a sense of glamour is
attached to it. To me a startup is a company which is looking at disrupting an
industry or a segment of the industry and scaling at a rapid pace. Not every
founder is a startup founder and not every fund raised is associated with a
startup. Again I want to make it very clear these are my point of views and I
am no expert.
Why am I talking about startups?
I am able to give my sense of it because I have spent the
last few years in the industry and consider myself privileged to be a great
part of it. I have spent time building and scaling teams and products at
various startups, some really early stage and some at Series C and beyond. This
has helped me understand the world at different stages of the startup cycle.
Life at a startup in the various stages
Early stage startups are probably the best and worst place
to start your career. Working in a startup itself is very risky because proof
of concept is yet to be established and early stage means even higher risk.
Early stage to me is defined as any startup that is in the ideation phase or
yet to launch the product in the market. At this stage the learning is huge,
even better than the Top B schools but the risk of it all failing is always
over the head. At an early stage there is no predefined role and this means one
can wear multiple hats, learn different aspects of a job which in a traditional
set up would never be offered. For instance while I worked in an early stage I
designed product wireframes despite having worked in sales prior to it all my
life and my job involved working with the tech team to ensure a beautiful easy
to use product. This learning helps me everyday till date. So if you are early
in your career or if you have a great risk appetite and believe in the product
and founder take the plunge. It can definitely build your career.
Post funding world in the startup
After a startup has raised multiple rounds of funds, it
becomes slightly more structured but super aggressive in expansion. A great
place to be in, if you want to prove a point, grow and make some money while
the sun shines. At this stage the start-up is using all this money raised to go
behind the market and the hustle mode is real. Everyone in the company is
focussed on getting the market share to an all time high. This is relatively a safer
place in a startup as much of the proof of concept has been established and it
is the execution which decides the future fate of the startup. There have been
times when this stage has ended up in a disaster because the founding team was
unable to execute things well and it resulted in massive layoffs or strategy
change at the end of the hustle. But learning is intense here as well. All
startups will experiment with multiple ways to expand and establish themselves
in the market, the effective ones continue and the ones that do not yield
results are shut. Either way the point I am trying to make here is Startups are
a great place to be at, if you are good at what you join them for you are well
rewarded but there is always the risk of if the product market fit is ever
going to be there. If the product is not something the market needs even the
best of teams cannot save the company.
Indian Startups
For starters Indian startups are extremely different from
our western counterparts. I am able to comment on this because I have worked
for both these ends of the spectrum. For the simplicity of my writing we are
going to be heavily focussed in this article only on Indian startups.
Startups ain't for every one and vice versa. Some enjoy the
entire journey at a startup while some absolutely hate it. Just like the
product market fit is important, so is an employee company fit. Startups in
India are majorly about 3H according to me as an employee. Hunger, Hustle
and Hangover.
Hunger to learn and grow. Hustle to outperform and be
independent. Hangover becuase it just doesn't go, it is a repeat mode , new
challenge thrown everyday.
The hustle is not just a word used in the industry, it is
real. You wake up to a new challenge every day. Everyone at a startup is
looking to outgrow and outperform. There is always someone smarter than you if
you do not keep up with the pace of the learning curve you are very much
replaceable. The industry challenges you and makes you better at what you do
every day. If you are willing to grind with the 3Hs defined above along with
learning and picking up new skills, you will do well and you will enjoy and be
well rewarded in a startup.
Culture
Every startup has its own culture, some are great, some are
not so great. It depends on which stage of life one is and to choose the
culture they think they will thrive the most under. Some folks do really well
under pressure, I in my initial days though not in a startup was working in a
high pressure environment and I did well. As I got older I felt the necessity
of a more relaxed work life balance. Every startup will promise to teach you
something in front of their style of work and it is upon to experience this as
a learning curve. However there are some Indian startups that take advantage of
the large talent pool available in India and exploit the employees with
unwanted long working hours and unrealistic targets. These are coming out in
the open more recently than before. A great culture according to me is one
where an employee wakes up everyday and is motivated to come out strong at the
end of the day and feels a sense of accomplishment at the end of the day. A
company where employees are always worried about losing their job or always
under stress is something that is toxic and one should leave such places for
their own sanity. These companies will learn the lesson over a period of time
but for now it is upon us to select the right ones and ensure we only leave the
organisation if our learning and growth curve is stagnant and not because the
salaries paid out are higher. Higher salaries can mean a trap at times, you
sign up your entire life to the company for that extra pay. We need to decide
if that is worth it?
Management team
Another aspect to look at is the management team running
the show. It is often seen that a company is functioning exactly like how the
leaders on the top want their organisation to function. So it becomes very
important to understand the nature of the leadership team. Do you aspire to be
one of them and do you think you will be able to work together in such an
environment. There is no easy or right or one way to understand this. Reading
up interviews, articles and talking to colleagues can definitely help
understand the nature of the person.
Peers
Most important factor to consider while joining a startup
are the peers. Since the structure in a startup is usually not well defined and
work is usually taken up with full ownership from start to finish, it becomes
very important to consider the peers who one will be working with, as most of
the time is spent with them. One can discuss, debate ideas with peers and
having smart ones becoming even more important at this stage. Being the
smartest person in the room is not necessarily a good place to be in. Startups
thrive on open culture and so having the right set of people surrounding you
becomes super important. This ensures you come out of the company a much
better, smarter and capable person than when you went in.
Solving real world problems
All startups claim to be solving a real world problem. All
of them claim there is a huge market potential. While choosing a startup it
becomes super important to understand how well you think the solution is
helping the world. If you do not believe in the product, it is more likely for
you to fail. Always understanding the product and what the startup is building
becomes super important. Aligning with the larger company goal and to position
one and see if they really want to do this becomes super important.
The conclusion
Love it or hate it you just can not ignore it. The startup
world is here to stay. It has created massive opportunities and taken India to
the global map. India is the third largest startup ecosystem in the world.
India in the last year alone added 3 unicorns (companies that are valued at $1B
or more). Since 2018, cumulatively 5,98,324 jobs were generated by start-ups,
according to the Union government. India has 90 unicorns right behind the USA
with 487 & China with 301. The total funding coming into the country is
proof that global investments are very interested in the market and believe
that Indian startups have what it takes. Indian startups have raised $42
billion in 2021, up from $11.5 billion in the previous year, according to a
report by Orios Venture Partners. So startups are here to stay and hopefully
this write up will help one choose the right one for them.