Slate has a weekly segment on the New York Time's bogus trend of the week (http://www.slate.com/id/2259817/). Not 100% sure that this is the case, but this article didn't really ring true to me for two reasons:
1) All of my friends majoring in engineering or CS or anything tech are already deciding between multiple job offers all over the country. AFAI can tell there is a huge shortage of qualified candidates for tech positions; at least companies are recruiting heavily at my somewhat well known state school. I have talked to friends in other disciplines and it is definitely harder for them- but they are usually the ones much less interested in entrepreneurship as well.
2) While I see a much higher level of enthusiasm for entrepreneurship in general, I really don't see any higher level of students taking the plunge and actually doing it. Most people (like me) are deciding that given the high cost of college and their lack of savings/debt the prudent thing is to save as much as possible by working. Again- those who are considering entrepreneurship tend to be tech students with job offers they are turning down, not turning to as a last resort.
In short, the recession seems to either be ending, or just not particularly relevant for people with tech degrees, and I would obviously love there to be a ton more students diving into entrepreneurship when they graduate, but I think the trend is overstated in the media.
There are lots of opportunities for non-tech people to be entrepreneurial online. The internet's made it much easier to sell products and services at virtually no cost, it doesn't matter if your a designer or a drop-shipper, the tech is mostly prebuilt and out there for you to just use.
As tech entrepreneurs we should be figuring out what's stopping non-tech entrepreneurs starting their own business in their area of expertise/passion and figuring out how to build the tech that will enable them to do so !
I agree. When I read this, it felt a bit fake. While I plan on doing something entrepreneurial after college (June 2011), most of my classmates aren't built for it. I've traveled in developing countries by myself, started small ventures (mostly failed), ran student clubs, studied entrepreneurship in bschool, read a ton of businessy books etc. I've been building up to this for a while. Not that you need any of this necessarily, but I suspect it makes me somewhat more ready for the shitty parts of starting a business.
Most of my classmates (in psychology) would not be able to pull off a venture very easily with so little org or tech experience at 21-22.
The article cited a study which showed a good quantity of people getting job offers but decided not to take them.
I think the thing with this years graduates is that they heard the CS class of 09' got job offers of $50k and they feel satisfied with their $60k, not knowing graduates in '08 were getting 80k. People in the top 5% with CS degrees are always going to have jobs. But the real question is, are you getting paid a lot less for the same amount of effort?
Comments
Slate has a weekly segment on the New York Time's bogus trend of the week (http://www.slate.com/id/2259817/). Not 100% sure that this is the case, but this article didn't really ring true to me for two reasons:
1) All of my friends majoring in engineering or CS or anything tech are already deciding between multiple job offers all over the country. AFAI can tell there is a huge shortage of qualified candidates for tech positions; at least companies are recruiting heavily at my somewhat well known state school. I have talked to friends in other disciplines and it is definitely harder for them- but they are usually the ones much less interested in entrepreneurship as well.
2) While I see a much higher level of enthusiasm for entrepreneurship in general, I really don't see any higher level of students taking the plunge and actually doing it. Most people (like me) are deciding that given the high cost of college and their lack of savings/debt the prudent thing is to save as much as possible by working. Again- those who are considering entrepreneurship tend to be tech students with job offers they are turning down, not turning to as a last resort.
In short, the recession seems to either be ending, or just not particularly relevant for people with tech degrees, and I would obviously love there to be a ton more students diving into entrepreneurship when they graduate, but I think the trend is overstated in the media.
There are lots of opportunities for non-tech people to be entrepreneurial online. The internet's made it much easier to sell products and services at virtually no cost, it doesn't matter if your a designer or a drop-shipper, the tech is mostly prebuilt and out there for you to just use.
As tech entrepreneurs we should be figuring out what's stopping non-tech entrepreneurs starting their own business in their area of expertise/passion and figuring out how to build the tech that will enable them to do so !
I agree. When I read this, it felt a bit fake. While I plan on doing something entrepreneurial after college (June 2011), most of my classmates aren't built for it. I've traveled in developing countries by myself, started small ventures (mostly failed), ran student clubs, studied entrepreneurship in bschool, read a ton of businessy books etc. I've been building up to this for a while. Not that you need any of this necessarily, but I suspect it makes me somewhat more ready for the shitty parts of starting a business.
Most of my classmates (in psychology) would not be able to pull off a venture very easily with so little org or tech experience at 21-22.
The article cited a study which showed a good quantity of people getting job offers but decided not to take them.
I think the thing with this years graduates is that they heard the CS class of 09' got job offers of $50k and they feel satisfied with their $60k, not knowing graduates in '08 were getting 80k. People in the top 5% with CS degrees are always going to have jobs. But the real question is, are you getting paid a lot less for the same amount of effort?