Should you join TCS, Wipro or startup as a junior software developer?

Let me first briefly tell you about myself. I am a junior software engineer in a startup. It is a product-based company which sells software for interior design to people. I was taken as a front-end developer in this.

So…What’s new in it? And why have I written an article about joining startups or big companies?

Let me tell you a small story, my friend and I were searching for a job. He got a job as a Frontend Developer (React Js) in TCS, and I got the same in a startup. Fast forward to now, I met him on the weekend, and we discussed our little journey in the tech world. He was shocked when I told him the technologies I have worked on, from frontend, and backend to deploying code on AWS. In just a matter of one to two years, I have had more exposure to technology than him. Though our salaries remain the same ( we both cried on this).

Everything aside, I asked him the reason. And he told me the same as any LinkedIn post would, in big companies like TSC and Wipro which are service-based, ( I don’t know about Product Based Companies like Amazon etc), junior software developers either work on fixing small bugs or are on bench when there is no work. So the growth in these companies as a developer is Nil batee san nata. Whereas in startups even the junior developers may have the responsibility of a feature ( it may not be something big). It teaches a lot of things as a fresher from ownership to seeing its impact on actual users.

I still remember I removed sorting on the name (as we had a search feature on it) in one table thinking no one used it. The next day we got a call from a customer who complained about sorting not working on name. Yes, my code was reviewed, and tested (our company didn’t have testers, the developer was the owner of the feature so he was the tester himself, inspired by Amazon) but somehow it was missed, and guess who was blamed, no one.

Of course, it was a joke, I was blamed for it.

But I was not scolded for it. I was asked to fix it and within one or two hours, we deployed my fix. (So fast isn’t it). Later my manager after my apology told me to never remove any feature on my own.

I don’t know what would have happened in big companies, either it would have been detected earlier or I don’t know.

This is one of the many mistakes that I have done and learnt from them ( Yes, I made a lot of mistakes).

I not only learned about ownership, but as I was getting a grip of one technology, our team leader started delegating more work, from deploying code on AWS to writing backend for some applications.

It made me learn more and more technologies, and I was growing.

It was not the same for my friend. It’s been more than a year, and guess what his knowledge is still somewhat the same ( I am not criticizing him, he had tried learning from doing personal projects, but his speed is slow).

So should you join startups over these companies?

I would say take a step back and look what you want. Though I may have learned a lot, but still working on some Saturdays and Sundays is tiring. And we are not given extra money for overwork.

So would you be able to do it, will determine what you want (If the salary in both companies is the same).