Day 908

The Marketing Guy

For the past 12 years, I have been employed as a marketer. Starting off at a metro newspaper in NE Florida in 2006 and finding myself through all the different channels of marketing including owning my own digital marketing company as well as building marketing departments up from scratch. I like this stuff, I like the challenge of finding prospects, building strategy and processes, and training people to learn and grow in our exciting field. But man, working in a tech infrastructure startup in Germany - not necessarily on the radar. But that’s where I am now and this is the first 100 days of working in a remote-first, tech startup as a marketer.

Negative Day 40

Getting In

You know right away when you’re interviewing at a startup compared to a Fortune 500 or mid-sized company. Looking at startup websites and who works at them, you often see an array of styles, types of photos, startup-type titles and a focus on Product as well as Culture. Their websites give an air of easy going smartness that doesn’t need to be proven by a tie. There is a lot to consider when applying for a remote-first, tech startup job.

Time Zones

Once I was asked to do the interview, it was set at CEST (Berlin) time whereas I was in EST (Miami) time. This happens a lot when you’re looking for jobs abroad, and you can’t try and keep switching times on HR because you want that job right? This means lighting has to make sense, you need to look not asleep and you don’t want them to know that it’s the middle of the night because you don’t want to look too desperate or make them feel bad. You just wake up at 3:15am and put on your jacket and nice shirt and tie.

What to Wear

Which brings me to another point of interviewing at a startup. What do you wear - a hoodie? I think the long and short of it is no, you don’t wear a hoodie. Not as a marketer at least. But that’s up to you. I felt out the culture when talking to HR first (Jacket, no tie), CEO (Sweater), Team (Zip up Sweater). But now that I work here - hoodie.

Meeting the Team

The interview process is really cool in a remote-first organization. It’s a different type of meeting. Kind of like a family who you either fit in with or don’t. Which can be nerve-wracking but way more fun than in the Fortune 500 process where you know you’re applying for a job to be a number. The team looks and acts different than in a large organization. You know, the ever-present hoodies, the banter back-and-forth with the Co-Founders and employees, the stuff you see on TV. But what really caught my attention was because this is a remote-first company, I was now talking to people in all different environments. Some in co-working spaces, some with their beds directly behind them, and others walking on the street talking into their phone. Just a cool vibe.

After my research on the company, great interview process, and extensive research of the product, my decision was clear. I was going to accept the offer from Giant Swarm, a remote-first startup out of Cologne, Germany as my next place of employment. But the next 100 days, I mean who even thinks of that?

Running into the Darkness at Full Speed: Days 1 - 30 »