My entire career has been nothing but startups. Founded two and was a significant early employee at one and made their flagship product. For the others, I did work for the DoD, NSA, and architected and developed solutions for Fortune 500 companies in financial services, healthcare, CPG, and cybersecurity (highly regulated industries). I raised a total of $20MM, and directly and significantly contributed to bringing the company from $0 to $1.2MM in revenue (with $5MM+ in the pipeline) in a little over a year. I did a lot of software engineering, software and solutions architecture, product and project management, and a bit of sales. And I can’t get ONE. DAMN. INTERVIEW. Companies send me “no thanks” after 24 hours. (which I’m wondering if that’s a delay set with the AI systems they use? Because I got some of those emails on weekends). Does everybody have startup/founder experience on their resume at this point that it doesn’t stand out? Would recruiters rather see experience at big name massive corporations? If you are or know any recruiters, please reply with your perspective. TC: $125K + equity YOE: 8
How were the exits for you? Why are you looking to go to big co? Mind if I DM?
No exits so far unfortunately. The latest startup is still running (not sure for how long), but I got screwed over by my cofounder and laid off the day after being promised a raise and more equity. Contemplated a litigation but probably not worth it at this point. And really not trying to go big co. I’d rather be working on my next startup that I invented something for. But I don’t have any runway to pay my mortgage at the moment. So looking for something to cover my mortgage while I get that next startup off the ground. Please DM
I’d be worried about having you as an employee or coworker based on this
Former entrepreneur here, I had a similar resume 5 years ago, it didn’t hurt me then and now I have a solid half decade as an employee. My point is, don’t do it, go back to the startup world the rest is just shit with sometimes a little higher pay. There is no benefit to working outside a startup. Counting down the days till I quit
Yeah I’m not really trying to exit the startup work for big corporate. Just trying to pay my mortgage while I work on my next startup but can’t get an interview after 300+ apps.
Are you talking to in house recruiters or recruiting firms? The first kind will not know what to make of you but the second kind should be able to sell you, as long as you can map your experiences to specifically defined potential roles (CEO, Head of Product, etc).
Been sending notes to in house/hiring managers. Thats good advice about recruiting firms, I’ll try that
How do you find recruiting firms?
This market is so messed up. A lot of older recruiters and hiring managers would have absolutely valued your experience. In this economy most of those recruiters got laid off and you have these idiot college kids looking at AIs to make a decision. tl;dr tech recruiting has become an immature market.
Find another way to cover your mortgage, getting into a corporate role is a waste of everything you have, find an angel instead.
I think you might have a communication issue. Anyone in their moms basement can found a startup. It could be anything from WordPress site to discuss baseball games to a highly scalable AI trading app. I don't understand how you were a significant contributor to $1.2mm, raised 20mm, which means you were a CEO, but you are broke now? DoD and F500 is boring non tech focused, so most tech companies won't care that much. You need to tailor your resume better and specifically target a position you are best at, i.e., sales, project management, swe, or product manager.
DM’d. Being a former founder is what gets me 90% of my interviews.
Did you have a successful exit?
Yes