If you've never held a corporate job, you are lucky. It sucks your soul and crushes your dream.
There are good corporate jobs and bad ones. When I, for example, worked at IBM, I had a pretty good time and enjoyed the work, the people and the environment tremendously.
Conversely there are small company / startup situations that are totally soul-sucking. Especially when the economy goes into the tank and layoffs start and the managers start acting like fear is their only tool to motivate people. This happened when I worked at Lulu.com, and I never felt a great sense of the relief than the day I resigned and walked out the door.
I mean, don't get me wrong... I loved my colleagues there, so nothing about this is meant as a slag against them... but the job itself, the management and the vibe had reached a point that, when I walked to my car on my last day, by the time I got to my car, I felt like a 10000 lb weight had been lifted off of my shoulders... I could almost swear that the sky was a brighter shade of blue, and that the grass was greener and that the air smelt better, on the way out than on the way in. Sometimes all the nerf gun fights, and free soda, and $whatever, just can't make up for the other stuff.
If there's a point to all this, it's that whether a job is good or bad does not come down to whether or not you're working for a large corporation or a startup. There are a LOT more variables in the equation than that.
That said, if your job is sucking your soul and you feel the drive to quit (or get fired) and go found a startup, I absolutely advocate doing so!
There are good corporate jobs and bad ones. When I, for example, worked at IBM, I had a pretty good time and enjoyed the work, the people and the environment tremendously.
Conversely there are small company / startup situations that are totally soul-sucking. Especially when the economy goes into the tank and layoffs start and the managers start acting like fear is their only tool to motivate people. This happened when I worked at Lulu.com, and I never felt a great sense of the relief than the day I resigned and walked out the door.
I mean, don't get me wrong... I loved my colleagues there, so nothing about this is meant as a slag against them... but the job itself, the management and the vibe had reached a point that, when I walked to my car on my last day, by the time I got to my car, I felt like a 10000 lb weight had been lifted off of my shoulders... I could almost swear that the sky was a brighter shade of blue, and that the grass was greener and that the air smelt better, on the way out than on the way in. Sometimes all the nerf gun fights, and free soda, and $whatever, just can't make up for the other stuff.
If there's a point to all this, it's that whether a job is good or bad does not come down to whether or not you're working for a large corporation or a startup. There are a LOT more variables in the equation than that.
That said, if your job is sucking your soul and you feel the drive to quit (or get fired) and go found a startup, I absolutely advocate doing so!