"What Startups Really Mean" post

_posts/2018-12-04-what-small-business-really-means.md

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+---
+layout: post
+title: "More \"What Companies Really Mean\""
+description: "when they ask \"Why should we hire you?\""
+category: 
+tags: []
+---
+
+I recently stumbled across a phenomenal small article entitled 
+[What Startups Really Mean By "Why Should We Hire You?"](https://angel.co/blog/what-startups-really-mean-by-why-should-we-hire-you).
+Having been interviewed by smaller companies (though not exactly startups),
+the questions and subtexts are the same. There's often a question behind
+the question that you're actually trying to answer, and I wish I
+spotted the nuance earlier in my career.
+
+Let me also make note of one more question/euphemism I've come across:
+
+# How do you feel about Production Support?
+
+**Translation**: *We're a fairly small team, and when things break on an evening/weekend/Christmas Day,
+can we call on you to be there?*
+
+I've met decidedly few people in my life who truly enjoy the "ops" side of "devops".
+They're incredibly good at taking an impossible problem, pre-existing knowledge of
+arcane arts, and turning that into a functioning system at the end. And if they all
+left for lunch, we probably wouldn't make it out the door before the zombie apocalypse.
+
+Larger organizations (in my experience, 500+ person organizations) have the luxury
+of hiring people who either enjoy that, or play along nicely enough that our systems
+keep working.
+
+Small teams have no such luck. If you're interviewing at a small company, especially as a
+"data scientist" or other somesuch position, be aware that systems can and do spontaneously
+combust at the most inopportune moments.
+
+**Terrible-but-popular answers include**: *It's a part of the job, and I'm happy to contribute.*