Career Advice (Web Dev vs Associate Product Manager)
I currently have two good job offers and no great entrepreneurial ideas. Which job should I choose?
The web dev position is for a university on a small team that commends work-life balance and pays jr-mid level (approx 60k). I'd stay local where rent is covered and I could save the majority of my paycheck. I'm a jr-intermediate developer and I'm hoping that this would be a great opportunity to level up as an engineer. FWIW, the office/team are less inspiring.
The PM position is for a recently acquired startup in Los Angeles. The pay is approximately 65k with regular compensation reviews and vested stock options. In terms of work-life balance, the team claims everyone works about 8 hours a day. Rent for anything reasonable would cost a little more than half of my paycheck. There are more unknowns here considering a concurrent merger with a former competitor-- will there be duplicity of roles, will I have a job in 6 months?
I suspect that the web dev position path is more logical and may lend itself to more entrepreneurial side-projects. But, if it doesn't, the PM path might be a better career move-- possibly becoming an executive down the road (and I'd be leapfrogging years of writing software); alternatively I could be stuck in mid-level management hell forever. I'm completely torn and would love helpful advice.
Startup life is never 9 to 5 xD Moreover I have some friends in LA and to me it looks a really low salary, but I can't say for sure.
If you plan to create your own startup the first offer is better for 2 reasons: 1) you keep learning and coding, 2) in a university environment you may meet other entrepreneurs-wannabe and create a team.
On the other hand, from a career point of view, the PM opportunity is better, even though "job titles" in startup environments counts nothing. Try applying for an executive position at Google having job experience as CTO of xxx, where xxx is your own founded startup! They will probably laugh at you xD
You seem torn between the two because you prefer the undefined potential of the PM position. So define your ideal:
Let the startup know you've got another offer and you're torn because you want to work in/with startups but the stable/traditional offer is offering much more (including in terms of relative value - don't underestimate the cost of stability/happiness/work-life balance).
Then ask for those three things above.
If the startup can provide them, boom you've got an opportunity. If not, don't do it. You'd be taking on all the risk for no reward, and as fellow founders the startup should understand your perspective.
If the startup tries to make you feel guilty for being assertive and transparent about your needs, get out ASAP and don't look back.
If you prefer:
-> Detail oriented work
-> Problem solving
-> Intellectual challenge
-> Straightforward day to day work
-> Consistency
Then choose the web dev option.
If you prefer:
-> Leadership
-> Communication
-> Focusing on the big picture
-> Juggling different teams
-> Taking ownership, even of other people's problems
Then choose the Product Management option!
The PM position sounds like something that could give a lot more insight into product design and marketing which will be very valuable when starting your startup. It will give you exposure to both the business and technical side which is a combination that many founding engineering teams lack and spend a good amount of time figuring out.