What it Means to Work for Start-Ups?

Ever since I graduated from IIIT-B, life has been eclectic, restless and on the toes all the time. It’s been over 6 years that we graduated from IIIT-B. After graduation, I landed in a large MNC in a testing role.  It’s always the willingness to do more that had driven me to IIIT-B, the same willingness to do more made me look to greener pastures that had challenging, exciting and a fast paced environment. This made me to land in Mumbai for a product that was recently started where my friend Karthik was spear heading the product. 

No doubt we have moved out of Mumbai, Karthik along with Vikranth having his own start up – dataweave and I moving to another product start up in Pune. It’s been a very exciting , thrilling and one hell of experience to go through. Perhaps the best time to take risks and experiment in life.  There are certain lessons that we learnt along this journey and some important things that we earned in start-ups are

1.Challenging – It’s not only the technical work that must be challenging; the challenges that you face working in a start-up are many fold. 

• Lack of Processes – There are no processes or minimal processes. You need to write the lyrics, compose and sing it too. It’s all up to you what you do and how well you do it.
• Communication Gap – As there is lack of process, people come from varied background there would be communication gap as well.  Handling this is in itself a daunting task.
• Time Constraints – There is a saying ‘what you do tomorrow, do it today, what you do today, do it now’ but in start-ups you always have this ‘you should have done it yesterday’. Time will be the major constraint all the time.

2.  Security – Everyone is aware of the fact that there is no job security in this new modern world. Hire and fire policies are the norms. But, still people believe that working for large companies is secured. But, the fact is that, in large companies you never know when the layoffs are expected. In start-ups, you are always aware of the start-up may fail and you are prepared for the worst and moreover you will never be in a comfort zone. Of course, working in large companies has its own merits.

3.  Camaraderie – Since start-ups have very few people, working in team is quite amazing. And, an excellent camaraderie is formed among the people and they last with you forever even after you quit the company.

 
4.Scaling – You will face a challenge of scaling your product not only technically but also you learn how to scale people with limited time frame. Employees are the great assets to the organization and if you don’t help people to scale, your product will never scale. Once people scale, there is a satisfaction to see people growing.

5.Perspective- Start-ups give you the opportunity to work across teams ranging from application; database, Infrastructure, analyst, clients, HR, management and you get an insight from each perspective and understand how an organization functions. It is imperative to know these if you want to start you own firm. 

  

6.Hiring Skills – The Indian team might have won the champions trophy, but it is the selectors who get you the right set of people. Likewise, in a start-up you get an opportunity to hire people and hiring the right people is a skill that you may discover as you grow. Since team size is small, it’s inevitable to get the right people. 

  

7.Communication Skills - While it is a well-known fact that communication skills are quite poor for a fresh graduates in this country. There is an opportunity to polish your communication skills via emails, over phone, conference calls etc.

  

8.Conceptualization – As you grow, start-ups give you the opportunity to conceptualize and foresee things that lay ahead of you. You shall start visualizing the product, the requirement and can sense the need of the client as well.

9.Entire Life Cycle – You get an opportunity to work for an entire life cycle of the product. At times, you may come across a product that fails and at times a product that becomes successful.

10.Leadership Skills: You not only learn to work in a team, but also to lead a team. Along the lines you cultivate people skills. You also start setting policies that has larger impact on the organization.

These are some of the reasons why you may want to work for a start-up. Definitely, there is a tremendous growth, steep learning curve and further you get an extra edge to start your own company. The market has immense opportunity for those people who have learnt the art of working in start-ups and you also have a chance to land up in large company in a larger role!

Memoirs of IIIT-B

Anything that happens in reality happens twice, once in your head and once in reality. Your thoughts are the most powerful thing in the world. And, this thought is kindled at your home which is your first school and then by your teachers at your school. There are very few places in the world where your thoughts and your perception are elevated to a higher level than what you have and you start imagining the big picture. One of such places is to be in IIIT-B. And, it was indeed a privilege to have studied at IIIT-B.

It was a chance encounter with my friend who was in Bangalore for a brief visit suggested me to apply for IIIT-B. And, indeed it was a life changing suggestion as it has made me to never look back again at the past. Having come from working in the night shifts, I walked in to the campus imagining a good night sleep from here on.  But, this was the start of sleepless night and days; sometimes we were awake for few days at stretch. I remember discussing with my friend who is in Air Force, that they slept between 2 am & 4 am and had gruelling intense training for the first 6 months or a year. Coming from a non-computer science background, I felt I was undergoing such a training session and we had to give our best. After all you are surrounded by those who are toppers for their respective university, college and are instant problem solvers. 

While the classes used to start at 8am, we used to get up at 745 am :) . And, it used to continue till 4 or 5 in the evening with a quick snack break in the morning and a lunch break in the noon. Post the classes, there used to be tests, then special classes, then tests and then some deadlines and so on and so forth. And, your day used to end at 4am. It was a never ending cycle and you had to be 200% focussed.

Despite having brilliant minds around, the exams were so hard that the average scores were in single digits and people would be happy if they were above the average. We wondered whether we really scored so well in our past engineering schools. And, I would blame the education system that encourages tuitions, preparation of notes etc.  Though we scored less, it made us to think hard about how this problem could be solved.   And, if the exam is open book, then definitely you will not write much in the paper.  And, this imbibed thinking which has lacked in our education system.

Despite having such a tight schedule, there used to be games, trips and who can forget the kicks on those who had their Birthday’s followed by the holy dip in the pond. I still relish viewing the World Cup football in the hostel on a giant screen, the volley ball match during the annual games event where all the girls were hooting for my junior dear friend ;).  Also, I learnt those nuances of photography from another junior friend who used to share tips while sipping coffee post mid night. This gave us opportunity to have fun and enjoy things in whatever we do.

‘Jnanam Uttamam’, knowledge is supreme is the punch line of IIIT-B. True to its punch line, there are scores of opportunities to work with eminent professors who are so well versed in their streams and knowledge drives them to crave for more. They have their own labs, projects, they publish in elite journals, conferences which gives you opportunity to explore new ideas and know your true potential.  Several of us got opportunities to publish in papers, credits in patents, opportunity to visit different countries, conferences etc.

The opportunities are endless; there is a SPICMACAY which conducts music events.  Also, an association was formed with National Entrepreneurship Network, which gave us to meet several eminent personalities that we would never have been able to meet. Some of them include Mc Afee India VP, Infosys Chairman, ICICI MD, Ashoka foundation fellows and many more. Listening to these people inspired us and also helped to build the network. There were also efforts on the Social side ‘Aikyam’ for helping the poor kids. The opportunities are endless and it helps you discover what you want in life. 

As the sun rises on 7^th July, IIIT-B will be having its 13^th Annual convocation. And, many more students will be graduating and going to chase their dreams. It was on this day that the previous batches have graduated and what a day it was a total feeling of celebrities who were being clicked by the media, parents and guardians on both the sides of the procession from the college main entrance to the convocation venue. Indeed it was such moment of joy that we relish it forever. And, it would be quite inspiring to hear from the Chief Guest as well. Post the convocation, throwing the hat will ever be enshrined in the memory.

Thanks to the beloved Director, professors and the management to have such wonderful institute. 

Before you decide to buy a Camera

It was a photo from my dear friend Raghuram Ashok that made me inquisitive to learn more about photography. Since then I have tried to learn as much as I can and I still do a shoot which are here and here. I have tried my hands on people, kids, caves, stills, streets etc.  Have done couple of exhibitions as well. I have been asked by several people, what camera I should buy. Here are some tips before you decide to buy a camera

• Purpose: First of all understand the purpose, why is it you are buying the camera. Following may be some of the reasons
• Family Events, Casual shoots etc.
• To be a professional and/or to learn and explore
• Budget: Once you decide the purpose, decide the budget. You get a camera right from around Rs. 5000 onwards to few lakhs of rupees.
• Decide the camera: Once you have decided the purpose and the budget, now it’s time to decide the camera. Note the following 
• Family Events, Trip etc.:Depending on the budget you can select cameras ranging from Rs. 5000 to Rs. 20000. 
• Professional: If you want to be a professional, then start with a prosumer camera. These start around with Rs. 10000 onwards and have the functionalities of DSLRs. Understand the functionalities and then upgrade to DSLRs once you are fit to be a pro. You can even start with DSLR if you are serious about it but I wouldn’t recommend this.

Points to be noted

1. Camera doesn’t matter:   Photography is not about DSLR or any particular camera. Camera just gives you the view of what is already imprinted on your mind. It just brings up the reality of what you have thought before the click. Camera may matter at times, but without you knowing how the picture should be, camera will be useless whatever expensive it may be. There are lot of people who use point and shoot cameras and have done exhibitions and are doing well.  The photos that you see on my link viz. flickr are from prosumer.

2. Don’t buy just because you have money:  Just because you have money and have disposable income, don’t buy expensive camera.  Just think about the number of events you capture every year and see what best suits you. You can even buy less than Rs. 10000 cameras and it may serve your purpose than buying Rs. 20000 camera.  Most of the time, people who ask me intend to buy a very expensive one without understanding their need.

3.  It’s not about Pixels:  Most of the marketing strategies to sell camera is focussed on the Megapixels, but the Mega Pixels are of little value addition unless you are highly professional expert.  A 1 Mega pixel camera will also do. Adding more Megapixels just increases the size of the photo on your hard disk.  Preference should be given more to Optical Zoom then megapixels or digital zoom.

4.  Photography is not about DSLR:  This is the most important question that I have been asked. I want to buy a camera, Which DSLR should I Buy? Remember one thing, it’s not about DSLR. It’s about your purpose. No doubt, DSLR gives good clarity and may be available at around  Rs. 20000. But, they are bulky to carry, to be extra careful and you need to invest on additional lenses and that creates a dent in your pocket. It took me 3 years of using a prosumer before I graduated to DSLR. But, I still prefer a prosumer to a DSLR.  Point and shoot cameras are light weight, easily put in to a luggage while travelling, easy to carry around.

5. Photography is about Imagination:  If you think by buying an expensive camera, you can become a photographer then forget it. Photography is about the use of lights, your imagination and your thought. Camera is just a medium to achieve that.

Now, decide the camera, buy the camera and start clicking ;-)