Startup job help for MBAs. Are you an MBA? Are you thinking about joining a startup? Do you want help in figuring out which role is the right fit for you? What MBA skills are transferable to startups? What does a role in business development, product management, operations, sales or marketing / product marketing entail? Read this deck if you want to get a great overview on startup roles, frameworks for how to think about choosing a startup and details on each type of role that an MBA could play at a tech startup.

1. I am an MBA.
I want a job at a startup.
What role is for me?
Soundlikeyou?
Readon.
Presented by
Marianna Zaslavsky
Columbia Business School 13’ and InSITE Fellow 13’
Product Manager @ Eyeview
Business Development @ HookLogic

2. AStartupOrg
External
Internal
Sales
BD / Partnerships
Ops
Engineering
Gen. Mngmt
Product
Marketing / Product
Mktg
Analytics
Finance
HR
MostExternaltoMostInternal
Customer Success
/ Account Mngmt

3. External
Internal
Sales
BD / Partnerships
Customer Success
/ Account Mngmt
Ops
Engineering
Gen. Mngmt
Product
Marketing / Product
Mktg
Analytics
Finance
HR
Common post MBA entry points: Can you see a pattern?
Lots of external roles for MBAs

4. Regardlessoftheroleyoucomeinwith,onethingisguaranteed:
youaregoingto wearmanyhats

5. Youmayaskyourself:“WhoamI”?
And,“WhichroleshouldIpositionmyselffor”?
Thispresentationwillhelp you getsomeanswers

6. Tiny disclosure…
The following is highly generalized.
Every startup is different. B2C is very different from B2B. A
startup with five people is very different from a hundred-
person startup. Business models and products require different
organizational structures and roles.
My suggestion is to use the following deck to help you ask
questions about your role during your interview process.
If you know the possibilities, you can be a more informed
candidate…. and a happier employee once you make your final
decision.

7. The Hunter
Overview
• Competitive, confident, focused & independant
• Persuasive & respectfully persistent
• People & relationship person
• Empathy: you understand what motivates people
• Money motivates you; commission doesn’t freak
you out. You are ok with eating what you kill.
• You love being out of the office: wining, dining and
traveling
• You care less about the ‘how’- you are all about the
‘why.’ Do you want to talk about how awesome a
Porsche looks and feels (the ‘why’) or do you want
to talk about what’s under the hood (the ‘how’?)
• You care less for numbers and all the analytics
behind the product
Sales

8. The Hunter
Realnotesfromrealstartups
• Sometimes enterprise sales is called “Business Development”. Don’t be fooled. It’s sales.
• The role of Sales is to execute sales for an existing program, not to sell a thing that
doesn’t exist. The latter can actually be very dangerous for a startup: a commission based
employee should not be creating new product because this will blow up the product
roadmap. Sales is incentivized to close deals, not think about viability.
• Sales is supposed to be a relationship person who figures out how the product fits the
customers need (this is empathy). Positioning and obtaining the right info to position it
• You wont have pressure from engineering as a sales person (i.e. “you sold something I
cant build!”)
• Sales is a repeatable process
• Sales is about personality and being able to have conviction
• Profiling clients, finding low hanging fruit and figuring out the right words to use
• You don’t need to be technical or analytical, nor do you really need a deep understanding
of how the product works. But you do need to understand how to sell “the heart first”
(i.e. why should I buy this) and then secondly “the mind” (i.e. now tell me how it works).
• For MBA’s there can be a huge opportunity in sales: you will likely be the smartest sales
person. You will likely succeed in making the sale because you ARE analytical and well-
rounded and probably by nature have a deeper understanding of the product than your
peers. You hit your quota, make a huge commission and you work 9-5.
• Sales makes the most money at a startup usually
Sales

9. The Relationship-er
Overview
• You hate ‘hunting’ …but you are a people
person
• Problem solver: you like to negotiate and
find the best outcome for both parties
• Organizer: You can multi-task and don’t
get overwhelmed when juggling
• Creative & strategic: you are not afraid of
finding creative solutions to balance client
and internal goals
• You can explain complex things in simple
terms; you understand the ‘how’ and
reiterate the ‘why’
• You are ok structuring complex
partnerships and deals, without direction
• Analytical: You are comfortable with
numbers when needed
Customer
Success /
Account
Management
BD /
Partnerships

10. The Relationship-er
Realnotesfromrealstartups
• Unlike in sales, BD must sell something that DOESN’T t exist
• The “Art of the Deal” is crucial here – how do you structure something that
doesn’t exist but something that you CAN actually build
• You will have engineering (and product) to keep you accountable to realistic
features and timelines
• You absolutely must be analytical and understand how the product works
• You have to be very creative (which is why some BD folks get frustrated in
sales, where there is almost no product creativity required)
• You have to be brave; you may be establishing the very first connections,
channels, customers ….so THEN sales can sell it…and so engineering can build
• Account management can sometimes require you to be BD: while the key
difference is that you are managing a day to day client relationship (unlike in
BD where you may own relationships but they are usually not clients, they are
partners), sometimes that key account IS where all your BD comes from. It’s a
key relationship that only you get to own, nurture, make product suggestions
as a result of. As such, you must be a prioritizer, analytical, a negotiator,
creative, a great communicator, someone who is strategic and builds trust.
• In AM, you may be the face of your entire company to your #1 customer. You
have the access. Believe me, the CEO will be all over you.
• Depending on the role and the product, BD and AM may skew to the
relationship and creative side or the analytical side
Customer
Success /
Account
Management
BD /
Partnerships

11. The Story Teller
Overview
• You love explaining ‘why:’ you are all
about the value proposition of your
product / service
• You are creative
• You get into the head of your users; you
take their feedback as your guide
• You love growing what was already
built and sometimes you like building
new things with others based on your
customers feedback
• You are all about supporting sales
• You are analytical and are comfortable
with numbers
Marketing /
Product
Marketing

12. The Story Teller
Realnotesfromrealstartups
• Your job is the generate demand for the product which may mean
(depending on the type of company), you may be doing SEO / SEM / other
forms of direct digital marketing, you may be working with a PR firm or an
ad agency to create commercials and print ads, you may be creating
collateral to help sales, you may be building the website, you may be doing
trainings, you may be in charge of all events, or you may be super
analytical in charge of CACs and LTVs.
• Marketing can run the spectrum between 100% qualitative and creative
strategies or 100% analytical, number driven strategies. Regardless, your
key job is to understand the value proposition of the product.
• Your job is to know the voice of the customer and work with other parts of
the organization to cascade that through (whether that’s to product
features, BD strategies, or the way sales makes its pitch).
• You are in charge of go-to-market strategy (often in partnership with BD
and /or product)
• You are not building something directly with engineers, but you can work
with product to create the right design and features. Again, it really
depends on the company. Either way, you are likely much more in charge of
understanding the customer even more than product does.
Marketing /
Product
Marketing

13. The Builder
Overview
• You are a planner
• You love testing & learning
• Analytical, Rigorous & Strategic: you love supporting
data and you don’t make decisions without it
• Problem solver
• Technical, and if not, you are a quick study
• You have no problem saying ‘no’ and defending a plan
• You are 100% ok with ambiguity, uncertainty and
competing priorities
• You are detail-oriented
• You can balance long term vision and short term needs
• Can wear lots of hats and are ok with cross-functional
pressure
• You don’t even start thinking about “the how” until you
know exactly what the “why” is. So really, you own
both.
• You don’t do anything without numbers or data / proof
Product

14. The Builder
Realnotesfromrealstartups
• You have cross functional responsibility but no authority to manage, so be wary of dysfunctional
organizations. Your job will be hard there.
• The longer you have been in product at the same company, the more and more of an expert you become.
That can be both a good and a bad thing. Good in that you know more than the CEO. Bad in that you may
be pigeon-holed.
• You get a lot of grief; if anything is wrong its your fault. If everything is right, its never your doing (its
engineering, sales, BD).
• Marketing is a lot like product in early stages: what is the message, what are the channels, what features
are needed? As you run marketing more, it gets less stressful. Product gets more stressful and complex. In
Product, now you added tons of features, now there are tons of clients with unique demands, now you
need data warehousing and architecture to store and decision on the data you are capturing etc. Plus now
you are doing support and you are launching new products.
• Its probably the most complex job out of all of the ones on this list. Because of that, its super rewarding.
• You are in charge of sprint planning. Your engineers may not be looking to you for implementation and
“how” to build the feature (that’s their job) but its your job to know every detail about why we are
building the feature, exactly what it is supposed to do, how to test it and what the impact will be. So being
technical helps a lot, but in many places it isnt a requirement.
• Depending on the product, it can help to be technical because unless you are or are keen to learn, you
don’t have a sense of engineering estimates and so you may not be helpful.
• Be careful: product management is NOT project management. Be wary of that and the differences.
• Product, marketing and analytics are all starting to align. Lots of companies now have all of these
reporting to one person. Sales and Ops are aligning more and more to one person as well.
Product

15. The Coordinator
Overview
• You can wear lots of hats
• You have an obsession with process
• You have no issues raising red flags
• You are detail-oriented and never drop a
ball
• You like check-lists and organization
• You live for efficiency and cutting out
wasted time & effort
• You are more about the ‘when’ and ‘what’
• You love numbers and data
OpsGen. Mgmt

16. The Coordinator
Realnotesfromrealstartups
• Very stage-dependent (usually you see this role in later stages because in
earlier stages everyone is just moving so fast and fighting for initial sales and
initial product milestones). Don’t be shocked if in an early stage company there
is no process. Its typical and totally ok.
• You may create things like a product release process, a client onboarding
process, a data gathering process, or you may be doing special projects for
growth exploration (should we enter this new market?).
• Your job is to create scalable processes once your company hits its stride
• Your job is to avoid inefficiency in hand-offs, drops in communications etc as
your company has now grown
• MBAs can be great in these roles because they are by nature analytical,
structured and can create (and often execute) plans in companies with minimal
direction. MBAs can see big picture and create plans on the smaller scale to
achieve the vision.
• Your role at a startup could be to make average people do exceptional
things…because lots of people at startups are there because they are really good
at their particular role or they come from the target industry, not because they
are the MBA-type, thinking about process improvement and the best way to set
up and run the company.
• In other words, startups often have a lot of people focused on execution and
very few focused on the process of that execution.
OpsGen. Mgmt

17. Strategy
You will rarely find a pure strategy role at a startup
…if you see one, be wary of it.
Everyone is doing some piece of “strategy”, but mostly it’s the CEO and the
management team setting the vision for the company.
Startup land isn’t consulting…although there are elements of consulting in every
startup job. If you are coming from consulting, think about what is it about consulting
that you like, and see if you can find that in a startup role.
It could be the client aspect (BD / AM / Sales), it could be the structuring aspect (Ops
/ GM), or the problem solving aspect (BD, Product) etc. In any role at a startup, you
will make an impact and you will work on something interesting.

18. Reminder…
Before going full startup, think about what excites you in this
framework:
1. Consumer? Enterprise? B2C is very different from B2B.
2. Stage? Funding? A startup with five people is very different
from a hundred-person startup, and is way different from a
fast-growth 500 person startup.
3. Product, Business Model? Business models and products
require different organizational structures and roles.
Use this deck to help you ask questions about your role during
your interview process.

19. Tips for recruiting…
• Startups are a shadow economy, so network to find roles
• If you can solve a problem for a startup, they will give you a shot regardless of your
background. But please, pitch the team on something. Don’t just come in empty-
handed. Pitch them on something interesting, then they will definitely give you a
shot. Do your homework. Figure out how you can help. What’s your angle?
• Worry less about titles and worry more about the experience you can get. Is the
team good? Is their vision compelling? If so, get on the rocketship. What “seat” you
have on that ship…let that fall into place. Startups change every few months. The
founder(s) may not even know there is a role out there in the future that is perfect
for you.
• Do not go to a startup because of equity. Unless you are a co-founder, or coming into
a winning company as a executive, equity will generally be given in the form of
OPTIONS, not pure equity. Options are generally meaningless. You have to purchase
options once you vest them. There may be tax consequences. Vesting is usually four
years with a one year cliff (meaning, you don’t even start vesting until one year goes
by). Net-net: Don’t take a 40% paycut for the glimmer of options. Do take a paycut if
its for the experience, IF you can live on that paycut. Btw, you don’t always have to
take a paycut to go to a startup. Many funded startups pay competitive salaries.
Basically, negotiate a salary you need to live on normally and consider options as
gravy (that are worth something only if you vest fully, if the valuation is high, if there
is an exit, if if if)
• If you want to move into a certain role, meet lots of people in that role. Come
prepared knowing what the role is like. And come to the interview with ideas.

20. First they hate you, then they love you, then they hate
you again
What the f*ck do it take for a gangsta to win?
—The Game, Don't Need Your Love
So, are MBA’s loathed or loved at startups?
Historically, MBAs were loathed (“what have they ever built”). But today’s MBAs are
building things every day and are more entrepreneurial than ever before.
Will this sentiment change? Who knows. Who cares.
True to the startup game, EVERY startup employee including an MBA, must love the
hustle, bring that passion and be humble to win to the game.
Join a startup because you love the team, you love the problem they are solving
and you think they stand a chance. Don’t join for any other reason.
The startup game isn’t easy, but it’s the one that’s the most fun.
Promise you that.

21. Book recommendations
Sales: The Challenger Sale, Secret of Question Based
Selling
Ops and Product: Checklist Manifesto
General Management (but esp, the section on
product management for those PMs out there): The
Hard Thing About Hard Things
General Startup Stuff: From Zero to One (also Blake
Master’s Transcriptions from the book), The
Innovators Dilemma, The Founders Dilemma, The
Lean Startup

22. Need more help?
Reach out to me
m@zazzer.com

23. Real notes from real startups come
from MBAs working at
Jet
Venuebook
Pronoun
Sailthru
Special thanks.