swombat.com

daily articles for founders

Running a startup in the UK (or with a UK subsidiary)? Get in touch with my company, GrantTree. We help with government funding.
Why your startup shouldn't hire a Marketer from Microsoft  

Most startups already understand this instinctively, and it has been drummed in by a fair few horror stories from the dot-com-boom era, but it bears repeating.

Large corporation skills often don't translate well to a startup situation, which requires more of an enterprising "let's try this and see if it works" approach and an ability to work decisively with very few resources.

The key points from the article:

  1. Large company executives are often over-specialised.
  2. They struggle with small/inexistant budgets.
  3. They don't know much about how to create early traction and develop a market from zero.
  4. They need other people to delegate to.
  5. They can be very good at selling ideas, internally, that are very bad for a startup.

Conversely, the author points out that he'd consider a big company hire if:

  1. They are active in social media outside their job function.
  2. They are active in their local startup community.
  3. They can clearly and thoughtfully articulate why they want to work for your company.
More from the library:
How to validate a startup idea
Mocked and misunderstood
Focus on one thing