Ask HN: PhD, Startup, or Career?

[student]

I'm nearing the end of my undergraduate Computer Science degree and I've been presented with the opportunity to read/study for a PhD fully funded by my University. The trouble is, I also hold job offers with two of the most prominent software vendors in the world. I'm at a cross roads as to which route to take at this point.

To add further confusion to my life, I've also been given a great idea for a startup and have the chance of working with a really cool co-founder. I really don't know which way to go with this one, any ideas?

I'll give a short description of the startup just in case you are wondering. My friend did a year long industrial work placement at a finance company while at University. He worked in the anti money laundering division. While he was there he had to use some god awful enterprise software that made use of some pretty bad pattern matching algorithms. Basically, he wants to do a startup with me where we would develop a SaaS based application to do pattern matching against bank transaction records to spot fraud, this is a big market with a few well established players. There is no doubt that we can make better software with better pattern matching algorithms, our problem is getting clients (same with everything I guess). The software is commonly refered to as AML software in case you wanted to do a small amount of background reading on it. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-money_laundering_software)

[menloparkbum]

Do the PhD and work out your AML software company idea while you are doing the PhD. You can drop out when you're ready to run with your startup. I personally know about 8 people who have become software millionaires this way. It's also how places like Google and Yahoo! got started.

The "Real World" is totally overrated. Entry level software jobs generally suck donkey balls, even if they sound like they won't.

However, it is very particular to your situation. If your job offer is to work on Photosynth at Microsoft Research, turn down the full ride to Toledo State U. However, if you're funded at Stanford or MIT, turn down the entry level code monkey job at Amazon or Yahoo!

[zitterbewegung]

Thats what I am doing except I am doing research right now on computation as an undergrad and I am auditing classes to get the information to complete the research. Its fun when you can pass out of classes to simplify your course load (self study).

[physcab]

Well first, be thankful that you have incredible options. To be fully funded for a PhD is not unusual, especially for engineering/science fields, but in this economic climate there are far more people applying for fewer positions. The same goes for the job offers.

That being said, what do you really want to do? What are you good at?

I've written a bit about PhD life in another post (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=445082) and of course you are welcome to contact me if you are being pulled this way. Bottom line is that I think you should do the PhD if you are completely ready. Putting off a PhD will only make coming back to do it much more difficult, especially when bills start to pile on. Getting a PhD is not setting your life in stone, rather it will open up MANY MORE doors for you in the future.

The start-up sounds enticing. If you two agree about how much work needs to be done and this is an area that you are truly passionate about...just go for it! However, know that good ideas are not finite. There will always be time.

As for the job offers... Well, I tend to hate the corporate environment so I couldn't give you unbiased feedback. If you feel you can create value, and feel like your skills are valued, then perhaps its a good match.

With any of these, I would encourage you to talk with the people you would be working with. Your community will make a HUGE difference POST-college, because life after undergrad is shockingly different.

[mian2zi3]

Why will putting off a PhD make it more difficult? I had lots of options like the poster, and dropped out to do the startup. Ten years later I went back to finish my undergrad and get my PhD, this time in math.

[mmc]

Some good points - I agree with hs saying 'do the scariest thing'. While you're young. I think this means either the startup or the PhD. But you sound more interested in the startup - you didn't even mention your intended research area!

A PhD is lots of really hard and thankless work, and if you're not really excited about it at the beginning, you won't finish, and that's the worst thing you can do.

So - unless you're hiding your passion for research in your post, I recommend the startup.

I'm sure you know about them, but just in case: the AML field as represented in the Wikipedia article (and the sales report PDF it linked to) missed one company I know of who's been doing AML services 'since 1993', called Logica: http://www.logica.com/risk+and+compliance/350234053

[wallflower]

You could make the argument that PayPal with its fraud detection backend is primarily AML.

[jeeringmole]

I went straight to graduate school, heeding advice that it would be difficult to give up the comfort of a real salary for a grad student stipend if I went and worked first. I observed in grad school that the students who had done that knew why they were there and what they wanted far better than I did.

Fundamentally, you will only know in retrospect whether or not you made the right decision. On the other hand, the stakes are not as large as they seem: 5 years is 125% of your time as an undergraduate, but only 12.5% of your career. (In other words, you have time to switch courses later, though it may appear now that you don't.)

Finally, the advice I always repeat to people facing difficult decisions. (Anyone who knows where this came from is welcome to tell me. I would attribute it if I knew the source.) .... When you have a difficult and important decision to make, flip a coin. Not because flipping a coin is a good way to make important decisions, but because in the moments while it is spinning in the air you will know which way you want it to land.

Trust yourself, good luck, and congratulations on earning such a plethora of attractive options.

[abyssknight]

I'm just going to take a devil's advocate role here and say get a job.

A start up is nothing without capital, and until you get funded that capital is you and your cofounder. Your savings, your time. A job means you can't put all your time into your startup, but it also means you can eat.

Having coworkers to bounce things off of, learn from and both see and make mistakes is invaluable. You can learn how to start your start up from working at your day job. You might even meet driven, hard working people who can help.

As far as continuing your education, that's awesome. Do it, but get someone else to pay for it. If you work at a big corporation they'll usually offset the cost or even give you a free ride.

That said, do what fuels you. If you like to code, get the job. If you like the theory, keep on with schooling. If you're into the startup thing, just do it. If you want it all, do it all. Just remember to eat.

[CyberED]

Get some "real world" experience first. I got bummed out doing a Masters many years ago - got distracted by money making ops. So 20 years later I'm back doing a PhD. The topic is more practical and yet breaking some new ground from the academic perspective.

Don't let money dictate your decisions. Seek to optimise your experiences and that goes for life outside of IT & work. The startup option will teach you the most. Just don't count on getting rich. It so spoils the experience.

[hs]

you live only once, do the scariest/craziest thing

[amichail]

A word of warning about web startups: what you find interesting is not necessarily what the average web surfer would find interesting.

In fact, it's even worse than that: what you find interesting is not necessarily something that the average web surfer could even understand.

Of course, academia has its own problems (e.g., your peers don't really care much about your success and have their own agendas, which causes problems with peer review). Also, publishing stuff isn't really anywhere near as rewarding as having a successful web startup.

[bradleyjoyce]

There is no better time to take a risk on a startup then right off completing your bachelors degree! You can accept more risk, have more time to fail, recover and be successful in the future.

[kristiandupont]

Agreed. Leap - and the net will appear.

[gcheong]

1. Start-up

2. PhD

3. Corporate job

Order is from "earlier the better" to "later is better" order.

I would also suggest you read this: http://www.amazon.com/Smart-Choices-Practical-Making-Decisio...

[Mystalic]

I jumped into a startup at the end of my college career, but didn't have the burn capital to do it boostrapping. You may be better off acccumulating a bit of capital before throwing yourself into the start-up (the most rewarding, for most of us).

Remember, you can always change your mind and any software company you join does NOT have to be a career - you can quit and start your own start-up at any time if you have the courage.

[jules]

What do you mean by SaaS? Banks have to upload transaction records to your servers? Do they want to do that?

[webwright]

Do you have a sense of which one you'd regret punting MOST? I can't imagine not getting a PhD gnawing at you for the rest of your life unless you love deep academia.

I can't imagine regretting punting a job offer from BigCo, but people are different.

The startup idea sounds cool, but making a better (or at least decent) mousetrap is really just an entry fee for attacking the sales/distribution problems associated with enterprise software. Hopefully you or your partner are good at sales and eager to do it.

I think most people are likelier to regret punting on a risky choice than the safe choice.

[kin]

You should ask yourself what you are really passionate about. I'm currently going through similar options and here's what I have to say.

If you can do PhD later, then do it later. If it's an opportunity that you must act upon immediately, then do so. You'll double-triple your salary when you re-enter the corporate job market. However, keep in mind the being a graduate student is being an adult with no money. You'll have to tough it out for a few years.

The same situation lies with your start-up. You've already let out your idea, therefore you must invest a large amount of time and effort (money) to release before any competition gets there first. At that point, what are the odds of your success?

To be really cautious, I would personally go with the PhD and tough it out. If you're confident enough in your talent, you can develop for your start-up on the side. If, for some reason you fail at either or both, when you re-enter the job market, you'll still be worth gold.

[bluelu]

My former employer also had an AML solution. You entered the name of the person as starting point, and the solution tried to fetch all related persons from the web by analyzing the name where the person was matched. These names were then associated with different keywords to create a ranking for each person and for the original person itself.

One problem will be getting the contacts. Also different banks have different systems. Maybe you can work something out with avaloq (their system is used more and more in different banks). Banks will never transmit data outside of their servers, and even people working there will not access any web service at all, if their computers are connected to customer data. So you have to sell the hardware as well. I think the biggest problem will be to integrate into the existing system.

[alain94040]

Congratulations on lining up all the top options. This may as well be a rethorical question since it covers all the possibilities!

Normally, based on my background I'd recommend the startup as #1, the job at Microsoft as #2 and the Ph.D last.

But I must say I'm not crazy about the startup you describe. Would I really advise you to join a startup I don't believe in?

Failure is a great learning experience. Looking for paying customers is a lesson that neither Microsoft nor a Ph.D will ever teach you. But isn't it a little bit early? My preference is to become an expert first and then start something. You must do your own soul searching. Are you satisfied that you are "great enough" in your field yet?

For some, it takes a few years of a regular day job. For others, they are great by the time they get their bachelor degree.

[huhtenberg]

As others said - don't do PhD right away. Take a break from the school and have a closer look at other options first.

For one you may discover that you can do cooler stuff in less time and to more satisfaction. For two you may notice that not all PhDs are created equal.

I had a choice of doing PhD when I was graduating (that was in Eastern Europe and it required getting an approval, a recommendation and god knows what else, so it was more of a privilege than an opportunity) and decided not to. Now, looking back, I'm pretty sure the stuff I worked on in a past 10 years would easily get me a PhD or two. It also earned me enough money so I can actually go back to school and do that PhD ... only if I wanted to :)

[seshagiric]

You can narrow down the choices to two:

1. Take the startup job. In the worst case it will fail. If so you would have gained so much valuable experience in programming + project management + finance + HR. With that experience you will easily get a Senior level job in any company. And that is the worst case. If it succeeds the returns will simply be atleast 10 times more than that of a career life.

2. Given the market situation do your PHD, perhaps working on algorithms for detect money launder. The idea is by the time you complete your PHD (3 yrs?) the markets would have turned around surely.

And if the PHD is not in one of the top 10 universities, ditch the idea and go for the startup.

[puzzle-out]

Just one point about the phd, I noticed that some students who stayed at the same uni for postgrad grew REALLY bored with the place after being there countless years.

[noodle]

i'd suggest you sit down and take stock of what you need, first. if your situation requires you to follow a specific path, do that.

after that, figure out what you want, and follow that. you have time and little obligations (i'm assuming), so even if following what you want to do leads to a dead end, you have time and flexibility to get past that that you won't later in life.

[transburgh]

There are few times better in your life to start a company than in or right after college. Obviously you have made a positive impression on your uni and future employers, so work in the future wout be that hard to get.

I would say go for the startup idea since you see a need that could be better filled.

[_b8r0]

Go to the big vendor, try it out there. In the meantime learn how to launch, promote, grow a solution with a safety net. You'll have other ideas. When you do you'll be able to do them on their own and use all the advantages of what you've learned to push it through.

[seshagiric]

That's a nice idea but the problem is it is difficult to get such chance in big company.