Women Engineers in Startups</a> series, and our goal was to encourage more women to consider working at high-growth startups.</p><p>Why?</p><p>At YC, most of us have worked at or started startups, and they’ve changed our lives for the better. We’ve seen, firsthand, the impact they can have on one’s life and career. The amount you learn is immense, and a lot of early startup employees go on to start their own companies. </p><p>We believe the opportunity should be explored by every hard working, ambitious person.</p><p>Yet, when we spoke to our founders, we learned that very few women engineers apply for jobs at YC companies. We wondered whether there were misconceptions about startups that we could help clear up, or whether there were resources we could build to connect more women to startup opportunities. </p><p>So, we brought together a cohort of women engineers and introduced them to YC founders, engineering managers, recruiters and women who had joined YC startups as early engineers. They came together for three weeks, learned about what startups are looking for, what the work/life balance was like at various companies, and what they should think about and ask when considering companies and roles. </p><p>At the end of the first session, we were delighted to see a few women from that first cohort accept roles at YC companies. </p><p>One participant in that first cohort, Tess Huelskamp, accepted a role at <a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/middesk/">Middesk (YC W19), a fast-growing company that helps b2b financial services companies verify business customers. She shared her experience and advice for thinking about joining a startup here: </p><blockquote><em>Prior to working at my startup Middesk, I worked for a few years on Dropbox's Sharing team on a lot of backend changes to make it easier to share files and folders within Dropbox. </em><br><br><em>After a few years at Dropbox, I had learned a lot about how to build and ship code, but my learning was slowing. I always knew that I wanted to work at a startup before I moved home to the Midwest, and I figured this was the time to do it.</em><br><br><em>Before participating in the YC Women Eng in Startup series I didn't know a lot about the startup lifecycle. I didn't know what \"pre-\" vs. \"post-seed\" meant and I didn't know what type of work startups do as they move from trying to find product-market fit to scaling up their company. It helped me better identify the stage and type of company I wanted to work at.</em><br><br><em>When I started my job search, I knew I wanted to work at a post-Series A company that had a great culture, healthy work-life balance, and an interesting product. I found Middesk through the </em><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.workatastartup.com//">Work at a Startup</em></a><em> job board and took an informational call to learn more. As I was interviewing, I got a great vibe from the team at Middesk and respected all of the people I talked to.</em><br><br><em>I've been happily surprised with the breadth of work I've been able to do at an earlier stage company.</em><br><br><em>Established companies already have a lot of key features built, so the impact you can have is limited to improving an already existing feature. At an earlier stage company, I've been able to have a huge impact on my company by scaling, improving core business flows and also building multiple features from the ground up.</em><br><br><em>Earlier in my career, I was scared to move to a startup because I didn't think that I knew enough about engineering to be able to contribute to a startup. If I were to do my career over again, I would've left a larger company as soon as I felt my growth stalling out, because I could've easily handled working at a startup once I had learned how to ship projects at a larger company.</em></blockquote><p><strong>We’re hosting the second Women Engineers in Startups series this fall. Learn more about it </strong><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/blog/women-engineers-in-startups/">here.

Apply to participate by October 7</strong></a><strong>. </strong></p><!--kg-card-begin: html--><center>\n<a class=\"ycdc-retro-btn ycdc-retro-btn-gold mt-[-10px] ml-[13px]\" href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/events/yc-women-eng-in-startups-2022/?utm_source=ycblog\%22 style=\"text-decoration: none;\" title=\"Women Engineers in Startups\" target=\"_blank\">Apply Now</a>\n</center><!--kg-card-end: html--><p>* <em>We use an inclusive definition of “women” and welcome trans women as well as genderqueer and non-binary people who identify as women or femme in any way to attend this event.</em></p><figure class=\"kg-card kg-image-card\"><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/events/yc-women-eng-in-startups-2022/?utm_source=ycblog\%22>in-person tech hiring event on Wednesday, March 8th</a> at 5:30 PM at Y Combinator's San Francisco office. This will be the first in-person hiring event we're hosting at YC in over two years, and we have 9 YC-backed startups who are looking to hire engineers and technical talent.</p><p>The event will feature brief founder &amp; company overviews, time to network, and light food and drinks provided by YC. Spots are limited, so <a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/events/meet-founders-sf/">apply now</a> to get on the list.</p><p>The companies attending <em>(and what they're hiring for)</em> below:</p><ul><li><strong><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/events/meet-founders-sf/onesignal/">OneSignal (Growth):</strong> Engage customers through personalized omni-channel messaging <em>(Infrastructure and Product Engineers, Product Managers)</em></li><li><strong><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/memora-health/">Memora Health</a> <strong>(Series A):</strong></strong> Helps healthcare organizations digitize and automate complex care workflows</li><li><strong><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/events/meet-founders-sf/seam/">Seam (Series A):</strong> API for IoT Devices <em>(Engineering &amp; Sales)</em></li><li><strong><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/events/meet-founders-sf/slope/">Slope (Series A):</strong> Buy Now, Pay Later for B2B <em>(Backend &amp; Full stack engineers; data; customer success)</em></li><li><strong><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/events/meet-founders-sf/fieldguide/">Fieldguide (Series A):</strong> Automation and collaboration software for audit and advisory firms<em> (ML Engineer, Product Manager)</em></li><li><strong><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/events/meet-founders-sf/agave/">Agave (Seed):</strong> Plaid for Construction <em>(Founding Engineer in PHP/Typescript/React)</em></li><li><strong><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/events/meet-founders-sf/mintlify/">Mintlify (Seed):</strong> Developer-first documentation that converts users <em>(Full Stack Engineer)</em></li><li><strong><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/events/meet-founders-sf/replo/">Replo (Seed):</strong> Visual development for React, starting with e-commerce <em>(Engineers &amp; Designers)</em></li><li><strong><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/events/meet-founders-sf/oneshop/">OneShop (Seed):</strong> Operating system for reselling online <em>(Backend, Frontend and Growth Engineers)</em></li></ul><p>If you're an engineer interested in working at a fast-growing startup, this is an opportunity to meet founders and hiring managers in person to learn about their companies and products, understand their technology stacks and challenges, and get a sense of their culture and what it's like to work there.</p><p>This is a unique chance to engage with multiple companies at once, and to potentially find your next role at a leading tech startup. We hope you'll join us for what will be an informative and worthwhile evening.</p><!--kg-card-begin: html--><center>\n<a class=\"ycdc-retro-btn ycdc-retro-btn-gold mt-[-10px] ml-[13px]\" href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/events/meet-founders-sf/" style=\"text-decoration: none;\" title=\"Apply to YC Event\" target=\"_blank\">Apply to Join</a>\n</center><!--kg-card-end: html-->","comment_id":"63fced280ca0ec00016319fa","feature_image":"/blog/content/images/2023/02/BlogTwitter-Image-Template--5--1.png","featured":false,"visibility":"public","email_recipient_filter":"none","created_at":"2023-02-27T09:49:28.000-08:00","updated_at":"2023-03-06T12:57:26.000-08:00","published_at":"2023-02-28T09:00:00.000-08:00","custom_excerpt":null,"codeinjection_head":null,"codeinjection_foot":null,"custom_template":null,"canonical_url":null,"authors":[{"id":"61fe29e3c7139e0001a710bf","name":"Ryan 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Choi","slug":"rchoi","profile_image":"//www.gravatar.com/avatar/36ba914c5f191f813e96db0296154469?s=250&d=mm&r=x","cover_image":null,"bio":"Ryan works with YC companies to find great engineers — from 2-person startups to larger ones like Airbnb, Stripe and Instacart.","website":null,"location":null,"facebook":null,"twitter":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/author/rchoi/"},"primary_tag":null,"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/yc-spring-2022-tech-hiring-event/","excerpt":"We're excited to host an in-person tech hiring event on Wednesday, March 8th at 5:30 PM at Y Combinator's San Francisco office. This will be the first in-person hiring event we're hosting at YC in over two years, and we have 9 YC-backed startups who are looking to hire engineers and technical talent.","reading_time":1,"access":true,"og_image":null,"og_title":null,"og_description":null,"twitter_image":null,"twitter_title":null,"twitter_description":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"email_subject":null,"frontmatter":null,"feature_image_alt":null,"feature_image_caption":null},{"id":"61fe29f1c7139e0001a71bf5","uuid":"c98e294b-23ed-4634-868d-00fe5de36cdc","title":"YC Jobs Series: Women Eng in Startups","slug":"yc-jobs-series-women-eng-in-startups","html":"<!--kg-card-begin: html--><p>This fall, YC and <a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://elpha.com//">Elpha (S19)</a> will bring together a cohort of women engineers who are interested in finding roles at fast growing startups.</p>\n<p>YC will host a month-long series where participants will meet once a week for two-hour sessions. During sessions, you will hear from women who joined startups as early engineers, meet YC alumni and alumni company engineering managers, and build a community of peers. The program will culminate in at least two interviews for each participant.</p>\n<p>Topics discussed will include:</p>\n<ul>\n<li>Why join a startup? 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(Note that profiles are visible to YC founders and hiring managers at YC startups. If you&#8217;re not ready to share your profile or look for a job, please specify so on the application.)</p>\n<p><b><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.workatastartup.com/events/yc-women-eng-in-startups-2021/">https://www.workatastartup.com/events/yc-women-eng-in-startups-2021

/n

At YC, we use an inclusive definition of “women” and welcome trans women as well as genderqueer and non-binary people who identify as women or femme in any way.</i></p>\n<!--kg-card-end: html-->","comment_id":"1104901","feature_image":"/blog/content/images/wordpress/2021/08/YC-Jobs-Series-Women-Eng-in-Startups.jpeg","featured":false,"visibility":"public","email_recipient_filter":"none","created_at":"2021-08-26T03:24:01.000-07:00","updated_at":"2021-10-20T10:51:47.000-07:00","published_at":"2021-08-26T03:24:01.000-07:00","custom_excerpt":null,"codeinjection_head":null,"codeinjection_foot":null,"custom_template":null,"canonical_url":null,"authors":[{"id":"61fe29e3c7139e0001a710a2","name":"Kat Mañalac","slug":"kat-manalac","profile_image":"https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/c15939b217561ebda4c129bfea5f65f3?s=512&d=mm&r=g","cover_image":null,"bio":"Kat is the Managing Outreach Officer at YC. She was Chief of Staff to Alexis Ohanian, cofounder of reddit, before joining YC as its Director of Outreach. Prior to that, Kat was at WIRED Magazine.","website":null,"location":null,"facebook":null,"twitter":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/author/kat-manalac/"}],"tags":[{"id":"61fe29efc7139e0001a7117b","name":"Ask a Female Engineer","slug":"ask-a-female-engineer","description":null,"feature_image":null,"visibility":"public","og_image":null,"og_title":null,"og_description":null,"twitter_image":null,"twitter_title":null,"twitter_description":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"codeinjection_head":null,"codeinjection_foot":null,"canonical_url":null,"accent_color":null,"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/tag/ask-a-female-engineer/"},{"id":"61fe29efc7139e0001a71177","name":"Jobs","slug":"jobs","description":null,"feature_image":null,"visibility":"public","og_image":null,"og_title":null,"og_description":null,"twitter_image":null,"twitter_title":null,"twitter_description":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"codeinjection_head":null,"codeinjection_foot":null,"canonical_url":null,"accent_color":null,"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/tag/jobs/"},{"id":"61fe29efc7139e0001a7117c","name":"Women Founders","slug":"women-founders","description":null,"feature_image":null,"visibility":"public","og_image":null,"og_title":null,"og_description":null,"twitter_image":null,"twitter_title":null,"twitter_description":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"codeinjection_head":null,"codeinjection_foot":null,"canonical_url":null,"accent_color":null,"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/tag/women-founders/"},{"id":"61fe29efc7139e0001a71171","name":"Work at a Startup","slug":"work-at-a-startup","description":null,"feature_image":null,"visibility":"public","og_image":null,"og_title":null,"og_description":null,"twitter_image":null,"twitter_title":null,"twitter_description":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"codeinjection_head":null,"codeinjection_foot":null,"canonical_url":null,"accent_color":null,"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/tag/work-at-a-startup/"},{"id":"61fe29efc7139e0001a71179","name":"YC Events","slug":"yc-events","description":null,"feature_image":null,"visibility":"public","og_image":null,"og_title":null,"og_description":null,"twitter_image":null,"twitter_title":null,"twitter_description":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"codeinjection_head":null,"codeinjection_foot":null,"canonical_url":null,"accent_color":null,"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/tag/yc-events/"},{"id":"61fe29efc7139e0001a71178","name":"#jobs","slug":"hash-jobs","description":null,"feature_image":null,"visibility":"internal","og_image":null,"og_title":null,"og_description":null,"twitter_image":null,"twitter_title":null,"twitter_description":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"codeinjection_head":null,"codeinjection_foot":null,"canonical_url":null,"accent_color":null,"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/404/"},{"id":"61fe29efc7139e0001a7119c","name":"#1781","slug":"hash-1781","description":null,"feature_image":null,"visibility":"internal","og_image":null,"og_title":null,"og_description":null,"twitter_image":null,"twitter_title":null,"twitter_description":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"codeinjection_head":null,"codeinjection_foot":null,"canonical_url":null,"accent_color":null,"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/404/"},{"id":"61fe29efc7139e0001a7119d","name":"#1880","slug":"hash-1880","description":null,"feature_image":null,"visibility":"internal","og_image":null,"og_title":null,"og_description":null,"twitter_image":null,"twitter_title":null,"twitter_description":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"codeinjection_head":null,"codeinjection_foot":null,"canonical_url":null,"accent_color":null,"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/404/"},{"id":"61fe29efc7139e0001a7119e","name":"#21930","slug":"hash-21930","description":null,"feature_image":null,"visibility":"internal","og_image":null,"og_title":null,"og_description":null,"twitter_image":null,"twitter_title":null,"twitter_description":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"codeinjection_head":null,"codeinjection_foot":null,"canonical_url":null,"accent_color":null,"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/404/"}],"primary_author":{"id":"61fe29e3c7139e0001a710a2","name":"Kat Mañalac","slug":"kat-manalac","profile_image":"https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/c15939b217561ebda4c129bfea5f65f3?s=512&d=mm&r=g","cover_image":null,"bio":"Kat is the Managing Outreach Officer at YC. She was Chief of Staff to Alexis Ohanian, cofounder of reddit, before joining YC as its Director of Outreach. Prior to that, Kat was at WIRED Magazine.","website":null,"location":null,"facebook":null,"twitter":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/author/kat-manalac/"},"primary_tag":{"id":"61fe29efc7139e0001a7117b","name":"Ask a Female Engineer","slug":"ask-a-female-engineer","description":null,"feature_image":null,"visibility":"public","og_image":null,"og_title":null,"og_description":null,"twitter_image":null,"twitter_title":null,"twitter_description":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"codeinjection_head":null,"codeinjection_foot":null,"canonical_url":null,"accent_color":null,"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/tag/ask-a-female-engineer/"},"url":"https://ghost.prod.ycinside.com/yc-jobs-series-women-eng-in-startups/","excerpt":"This fall, YC and Elpha (S19) will bring together a cohort of women engineers who are interested in finding roles at fast growing startups.","reading_time":1,"access":true,"og_image":null,"og_title":null,"og_description":null,"twitter_image":null,"twitter_title":null,"twitter_description":null,"meta_title":null,"meta_description":null,"email_subject":null,"frontmatter":null,"feature_image_alt":null,"feature_image_caption":null},{"id":"63f91878d2b0220001e8d6e9","uuid":"a99f2458-1bdd-4a40-81e6-36ee441b133c","title":"Congratulations to the 2023 YC Top Companies!","slug":"yc-top-companies-feb-2023","html":"<p>We’re excited to present the 2023 YC Top Companies!</p><p>The startups are separated into 3 lists: YC’s top <a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/topcompanies/" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">private</a>, <a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/topcompanies/public/" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">public</a>, and <a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/topcompanies/exits/" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">exited</a>. Private companies and exits are sorted by the company's valuation from their latest funding round, and all are valued at over $150M. Public companies are listed in alphabetical order.</p><p>The Breakthrough Companies list highlights the fast-growing companies we’ve doubled down on – which means they’ve all received significant additional investment from YC in their post-Demo Day rounds. </p><p><strong>Here are stats about the companies on this year’s list:</strong></p><p><strong>&gt;</strong> More than 290 private YC companies and 33 exits are valued at over $150M, over 90 are worth more than $1B, and 16 are public. </p><p><strong>&gt;</strong> 58% of the companies have HQs in the Bay Area. 27% of the companies are fully remote, and 55% list themselves as partially remote.</p><p><strong>&gt;</strong> YC Top Companies have HQs in 40 countries including: United States, India, United Kingdom, Canada, Colombia, Indonesia, Mexico, Nigeria, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, France, Spain, Israel, Netherlands, Philippines, Portugal, Germany, Egypt, Ireland, South Korea, Peru, Singapore, United Arab Emirates, Australia, Bolivia, Switzerland, Algeria, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, Italy, Norway, Romania, Sweden, Senegal, Uganda, Uruguay, Venezuela, Vietnam</p><p><strong>&gt;</strong> YC W16 is the most represented batch (by percentage). 23% of the companies from W16 are on the YC Top Companies list. </p><p><strong>&gt;</strong> Here’s a sector breakdown of the top companies:</p><ul><li>B2B Software and Services: 43%</li><li>Financial Technology and Services: 19%</li><li>Consumer: 13%</li><li>Healthcare: 12%</li><li>Industrials: 7%</li><li>Real Estate and Construction: 3%</li><li>Education and Government: 3%</li></ul><p><strong>&gt;</strong> 10 new companies joined the lists since August 2022:</p><p>Private:</p><ul><li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/treasury-prime/">Treasury Prime</a> (YC W18) - Embedded banking software platform and marketplace</li><li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/onesignal/">OneSignal (YC S11) - Engage customers through personalized omni-channel messaging</li><li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/skill-lync/">Skill-lync (YC W19) - Online engineering college for India</li><li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/tigereye/">TigerEye (YC S22) - Modern enterprise software for sales leaders</li><li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/zeitview/">Zeitview (YC W15) - Inspection software for renewable energy &amp; sustainable infrastructure</li><li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/ontop/">OnTop (YC W21) - A bank for remote workers connected to payroll</li><li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/obie/">Obie (YC S19) - Insurance and risk management for landlords</li><li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/nabis/">Nabis (YC W19) - The largest licensed cannabis wholesale platform</li></ul><p>Public:</p><ul><li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/presto/">Presto (YC S10) - Digital meets physical for big chain restaurants</li></ul><p>Exits:</p><ul><li><a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/nurx/">NURX (YC W16) - Medicine or testing kit, prescribed online, and delivered to your door </li></ul><p>One thing to note is that this is not an exhaustive list of YC’s top companies. We allowed founders to opt out of being listed for any reason. The full list of YC companies can be found <a href=https://www.ycombinator.com/"https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/">here. </p><p>Congrats again to the companies recognized on the 2023 YC Top Companies list!</p>","comment_id":"63f91878d2b0220001e8d6e9","feature_image":"/blog/content/images/2023/02/BlogTwitter-Image-Template.png","featured":true,"visibility":"public","email_recipient_filter":"none","created_at":"2023-02-24T12:05:12.000-08:00","updated_at":"2023-03-16T09:44:58.000-07:00","published_at":"2023-02-27T09:00:00.000-08:00","custom_excerpt":"There are now 16 public YC companies, 290 private YC companies and 33 exits that are valued at over $150M, and over 80 that are worth more than $1B.","codeinjection_head":null,"codeinjection_foot":null,"custom_template":null,"canonical_url":null,"authors":[{"id":"61fe29e3c7139e0001a7106f","name":"Y 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Women Engineers in Startups: Tess's Story

by Y Combinator9/29/2022

Last year we launched the first *Women Engineers in Startups series, and our goal was to encourage more women to consider working at high-growth startups.

Why?

At YC, most of us have worked at or started startups, and they’ve changed our lives for the better. We’ve seen, firsthand, the impact they can have on one’s life and career. The amount you learn is immense, and a lot of early startup employees go on to start their own companies.

We believe the opportunity should be explored by every hard working, ambitious person.

Yet, when we spoke to our founders, we learned that very few women engineers apply for jobs at YC companies. We wondered whether there were misconceptions about startups that we could help clear up, or whether there were resources we could build to connect more women to startup opportunities.

So, we brought together a cohort of women engineers and introduced them to YC founders, engineering managers, recruiters and women who had joined YC startups as early engineers. They came together for three weeks, learned about what startups are looking for, what the work/life balance was like at various companies, and what they should think about and ask when considering companies and roles.

At the end of the first session, we were delighted to see a few women from that first cohort accept roles at YC companies.

One participant in that first cohort, Tess Huelskamp, accepted a role at Middesk (YC W19), a fast-growing company that helps b2b financial services companies verify business customers. She shared her experience and advice for thinking about joining a startup here:

Prior to working at my startup Middesk, I worked for a few years on Dropbox's Sharing team on a lot of backend changes to make it easier to share files and folders within Dropbox.

After a few years at Dropbox, I had learned a lot about how to build and ship code, but my learning was slowing. I always knew that I wanted to work at a startup before I moved home to the Midwest, and I figured this was the time to do it.

Before participating in the YC Women Eng in Startup series I didn't know a lot about the startup lifecycle. I didn't know what "pre-" vs. "post-seed" meant and I didn't know what type of work startups do as they move from trying to find product-market fit to scaling up their company. It helped me better identify the stage and type of company I wanted to work at.

When I started my job search, I knew I wanted to work at a post-Series A company that had a great culture, healthy work-life balance, and an interesting product. I found Middesk through the Work at a Startup job board and took an informational call to learn more. As I was interviewing, I got a great vibe from the team at Middesk and respected all of the people I talked to.

I've been happily surprised with the breadth of work I've been able to do at an earlier stage company.

Established companies already have a lot of key features built, so the impact you can have is limited to improving an already existing feature. At an earlier stage company, I've been able to have a huge impact on my company by scaling, improving core business flows and also building multiple features from the ground up.

Earlier in my career, I was scared to move to a startup because I didn't think that I knew enough about engineering to be able to contribute to a startup. If I were to do my career over again, I would've left a larger company as soon as I felt my growth stalling out, because I could've easily handled working at a startup once I had learned how to ship projects at a larger company.

We’re hosting the second Women Engineers in Startups series this fall. Learn more about it here.

Apply to participate by October 7.

Apply Now

* We use an inclusive definition of “women” and welcome trans women as well as genderqueer and non-binary people who identify as women or femme in any way to attend this event.

Author

  • Y Combinator