The Bangalore Startup Experience
An anecdote of my first startup experience as a college undergrad
A 9 to 5 isn’t enough for me.
Nah, I will follow my *passion*
Idea chahiye bas, fir toh aish hi aish
Startup is a trend today. It has evolved into a culture. Everyone wants to be their own boss, everyone looks at it with lusty eyes, but can you do it? Do you have it in you to actually startup? Is there anything special even, separating CEOs from normal janta?
I, like any other engineer, am a part of the startup-hype clan. Even I had these exact questions, looking for answers for which, I was fortunate enough to get an internship at a startup in Bangalore, the Silicon Valley of India.
Two months back, I touched down in this city, not knowing what to imagine or expect in the coming months. This was a city of complete strangers, without a single point of fully known contact at the time of landing, other than my Dad, who had come to set things up for me. I was excited, hopeful, nervous and cautioned with scepticism. I was sure of only one thing: to get to know startups as well as it may be possible. I wanted to meet and get to know the people who dare to actually embark and continue on this fogged journey, albeit of self-satisfaction. What vision do they have, what belief systems they function on, how do they stay sane!
In the very first week, it was evident how Bangalore is different from any other city. It is a city of youths. Almost everyone here has a rented space somewhere in the city; many wear glasses and carry backpacks while travelling on autos with plugged in ear-pods, blasting music. Most swiggy their meals every day, making each restaurant serve their own “Combo for 1”. Almost all everyday services like laundry, point-to-point delivery, and transportation are decentralised and optimised for the city’s young town boy. Just like that, there are countless PGs; each lane has “To-let” boards inviting guests over and also co-working spaces.
Multiple offices functioning from a single facility, benefitting from the common well-equipped Conference Rooms and Chai Point dispensers, is the ideal space for startups to flourish(after moving out from your own house-office). I remember being stunned by the look of my own office space; it was modern, well-lit, had vending machines and great coffee. To top it all, my particular office had the cutest husky to grasp all attention and send me on a guilt trip every day for eating fruits alone without succumbing to his accosting demands(only for your good, Dexter!).
Just like that, I got my first desk at a physical office. After initially fumbling to work with multiple screens, I made myself comfortable and got into the grind of morning meetings and code-ridden evenings. I learnt how offices function and what goes into envisioning a product. How the work is assigned, coordinated and accomplished. Every morning my team would meet up to discuss the progress made in the previous day and the plan for the current day. I loved the independence given to each developer regarding their own work. After being assigned to a developer, a task was theirs, and it was up to them to achieve it most efficiently. This was the trust that the seniors had in each developer, to give them the space to work however suits them best. Also, guidance and teamwork were in practice very efficiently. I, being an intern, was given a seat right next to the team lead to make it easy for me to bug him for help whenever I got stuck, which he always did, without question. My best learning happened during morning meetings when you learn about projects other than your own. It was during this time when I would intently listen to the discussion that I started building my understanding of the product we wish to deliver and methods to act on deliverance.
Further, I saw how value is consistently added with the detailed work being done here. Doing something which has not been done before comes with its own challenges. It makes you rethink solutions and look at available technology more minutely, to find ways to squeeze out your own path to achieve your goals and expectations. Low-level development, shredding the “benefit” of high level frameworks, gives you this power to achieve the unachieved. This particularly requires development of great expertise in the domain, to know and implement on the what’s what of the system.
Apart from the routine work that goes around from 10 to 7, was the office banter, which taught me it’s own share of things. Morning traffic woes, new tech releases, cricket analyses(which I was so out of), Hindutva and ottomans made the day whizz past in what looked like an hour on most days. During this time, I also got the chance to squeeze some time out with our CEO, going off-topic discussing one thing and another. Being a founder of a company requires the right mix of mind-bending philosophy and lightheadedness. Knowing that doing nothing is the most ideal way of life, and making what you do, count, go hand in hand. Fully believing that there is no other outcome possible than success and accepting any other outcome also go hand in hand. Being an open book while being mysterious is just the same.
Making it work does not depend on an idea. It depends on how much you think that the idea will work. Establishing a direct dependency on the people working with you, how much do they believe in it? It is the team and the value they are adding, that is, the technology that is created. Belief is not plucked off a bush, it is this added value, which is the asset on which you can stand tall without flinching an eye, making you believe, for real. This asset is backed by the team you put your trust in. If you believe, you find yourself working towards it, building stuff and making it happen, which is when you have started up.
I had heard people say: “The idea is just 1% of the startup,” I think I understand this statement to some extent now, if not entirely. So while starting up: focus on one thing, what value are you adding with this name? The answer to this one question would then be enough to make you wield your stick on the foggy road and rocky terrain.
Incidentally, I happened to go on a rocky trek with my team during my time here, and it was a challenging trek, both up and down. Going up was difficult because of the uncertainty. I did not know how steep it would get, how slippery the rocks ahead of me were and how much distance was left to cover. This became incredibly easier when I believed that I could reach the top, exactly when uncertainty turned into conviction. However weary, sweated out, or dehydrated, I’d undoubtedly reach. Coming down was easy just because of the surety of me knowing my way down, but was difficult because I was already tired and shaky, with my grip risking failure at some points. This became much easier when I started focusing, one hundred per cent on the way ahead of me. Finding the best way down, optimising the way based on my recent experience of handling such unwelcome rocks.
On the drive back home, only one thought looped in my head: that trek was exactly the story I had come to experience in Bangalore. The story of a startup, from zero to the top, to further ahead. The three-hour trek was such a succinct description of every startup from start to finish.
Both your laughter and cry count during this journey are greatly affected by the hands, holding you from slipping down and stealing your food when you’re looking away. It depends on the team. How to choose this team? I think this is the one question left to answer, which cannot have an objective method mapped out. I imagine it to be a gut instinct that would instantly say yes or no to a person in front of you, an acquired skill, in my opinion.
A starting point, a vision(even if blurred in spots) and some hands to hold, that could be listed as the potion to a startup, to hopefully someday, have you seated in a Bugatti, whizzing on the streets of Bangalore to your home, where, when you lay in bed, you can tell yourself, “Yes, I add some value to technology, and life, in general.”
Published originally on https://hillstotech.wordpress.com/
October 25, 2021