For all you first-timers out there… working at a big company August 27, 2008
Posted by hardly Career Development
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I worked at a big company once. It was a movie theater chain, American Multi-Cinema.
It has a great story regarding its beginning.
The founder, Stan, was running a theater in Kansas City in the early 60s. Problem was, he wasn't making any money. And, he knew that unless something changed, he wouldn't be in the theater biz for too much longer.
It's well known that theater owners make their money on the concession stand. And this has been the case for a long, long time. So, our intrepid hero said to himself, "How can I get more people in the door to buy my popcorn?" And, his answer was to divide his theater down the middle, creating two theaters in one location - the first multi-plex. Big suprise, it worked. Leading us to where we are today with H-U-G-E multiplexes showing a lot of movies with staggered showtimes, and AMC being one of the top companies in this business.
Here's the thing: AMC did not start big. It started small. And it got big by being innovative in the face of adversity.
As this relates to Development talent, there are very few small, start-upish, entrepreneurial companies that want to hire people from big companies. And, there are very few big companies that want to hire talent from small companies. The reality is that there are very different skills required for success at a small company v. a large company. They each have strong appeal, and like most things in life, different people like one over the other. Large companies tend to be bureaucratic, political, and very clear about taking risks (maximize the profit for the perceived risk). Small companies tend to be nimble, low on process orientation, and working on finding their riches in a new part of the eco-system.
One thing: Big companies are not less risky, career-wise than small companies. In both cases, you can be out of your job in a heartbeat. The market shifts, the company decides to allocate resources elsewhere, they go through a re-org, or they lose it all to hubris (see Enron & Anderson Consulting).
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