Pluspunten
Similar to other startups, there is great opportunity and room to carve your own path. I started as a Senior Engineer and gained experience as a Lead, Manager, and eventually working closely with clients as a Principal. Focused Labs is a great place to grow and cut your teeth working with all kinds of companies alongside some talented peers. I watched folks move on to join Google, NVIDIA, Amazon, DoorDash, and other well-respected companies - I think this speaks volumes of the talent they attract. The range of clients will give you exposure to many different companies, technology stacks, industries, and software development methods. I had the opportunity to work with Silicon Valley companies, 100+ year old enterprises, and learned a ton from how those teams and companies operate. Overall, my perspective is they are trending positively. I observed the company mature in sales, brand, marketing, hiring, and more. The company has gained a lot of focus and is learning from setbacks. At the time I wrote this the company was still small enough that you could drive the change you want - and that’s the beauty of a small company.
Minpunten
Similar to other startups, there is inherent risk and missteps are often felt more acutely. As the company learns more about how to operate, where to focus, and what customers want, there have been a number of pivot points. At a consulting company, where the service you offer is the talent, pivoting can mean changes that result in turnover. The company has learned a lot but the lessons were hard. Expectations are often implicit and I observed how this made growth and feedback challenging for some people. I felt that leaders struggled to articulate the behaviors to emulate, even when they knew what they wanted. I see this in a lot of the reviews on here and this is a key takeaway for the leadership team: make the implicit expectations, explicit. Focused Labs is learning to balance sales and people. They’re still figuring it out and, as with any startup, there are still many lessons to learn. If you want an environment with well-polished and established process, I would think twice about joining any small company. If you want an opportunity to gain three years of experience for every one, hop aboard and buckle up.