I Am Currently Working On My Third Job; In My Two Previous Jobs, I Was Fired Once And Resigned Once. Getting Fired Was A Terrible Experience For Me.

I cried all day. I never told anyone about it, Even my new friends and colleagues. I was so ashamed and humiliated that I told everyone I had quit my job.

I made up a lot of lies. I didn’t even tell my parents because they would be agitated. I only talked about this with my fiance. He greatly supported me and helped me find a better job.

Problems of a low-budget startup

Startups face many problems, the most important of which is funding. Startups face many issues, the most important of which is funding. I worked in a startup for a year. There were four partners in total. They only had one investor, and they were looking for more investors.
In the beginning, there are many things that a startup needs to do, but it does not have enough resources for it. It expects a lot from developers but pays less.
I joined that startup in February 2019 as an intern. During the internship, I was only paid $100, but I was satisfied because my first goal was to gain work experience. After three months, I was promoted to Junior Developer (Rookie).

A total of five programmers were working there. We all had to work harder, working overtime at least four out of six days a week. But the company did not pay us for overtime. They didn’t even appreciate it. They acted as if we were supposed to work overtime from the beginning. This is a red flag for developers. I advise all developers to change jobs if the company forces them to work overtime without benefits because they won’t change their ways.

We were working more than we could

The CEO gave us tasks and didn’t care if we did them quickly or slowly. He always gave us a lot of work which was very difficult for even senior programmers (with high experience and knowledge) to do in a week. We did not have a senior programmer. We were all junior programmers; There were no testers or designers. Therefore, the whole burden of work was on us. We had to work at least 9 or 10 hours a day, 54 to 60 hours a week; Otherwise, we would lose our jobs. If we could not complete all tasks on time, we would be humiliated by the senior manager in front of others.

He was one of the partners, so we could not sue him for a higher position. If someone showed up to work just 5 minutes late, they would get half a day’s pay but no extra pay for overtime.
I had previously applied for a new job in the two interviews, but I could not appear because I could not manage my time despite the demanding working conditions. I was not in a position to risk losing this job.

 Our program crashed

Then one day, the CEO entrusted us with a project to be completed within a month and a half; A mobile app and a web platform to create a customized delivery platform. They chose three developers, including me, to do this project: a backend developer, a Flutter developer, and another web frontend developer (me). They chose three developers, including me, to do this project: a backend developer, a Flutter developer, and another web frontend developer (me). Of course, the primary goal was to make a prototype to show potential investors to raise funds. The CEO told us it was tough to get an appointment with that investor, so we had to make it within a month and a half. So we were unfortunate to hear that we have to finish the project quickly; One and a half months is a very intensive schedule for any team. We knew we would still have to work extra long hours.
We prepared the project for the appointed time; it had bugs. And we informed the managing director and the senior manager about this issue. They seemed a little upset about this but didn’t say anything at first. The app crashed on mobile when it was shown to investors. This happened because of a text field. It required a text field of numbers, but the CEO entered numbers and characters. The app crashed when the admin entered string data instead of numeric data into Firestore on the mobile front end. We used Cloud Firestore to store the data to complete the project quickly. We used Cloud Firestore to store the data to meet the project soon.

The investor rejected the project.

Investors rejected the investment offer. In my opinion, the first culprit was the CEO. He should never have entrusted us with this project on such a tight schedule. The next culprit was the senior manager. He didn’t even test the program once before pitching it to investors. It should have been prepared for this because every program had bugs in the beginning, and if this program had been developed in a minimal time, the number of bugs would be more. Today’s young entrepreneurs may have many advantages, but a significant problem is their lack of experience. If they have more experience, they will have a better work environment and more productive employees.
However, after the investors rejected the project, the CEO demanded a clear explanation from the CEO. As expected, he portrayed us as the culprits and failed to explain that we had limited time, making us the victims.

Salary for two months and nothing else

I was involved in front-end web development. I had no involvement in mobile development, yet I was fired. They said the design is not good. I do not deny it; I am not a designer, and they should have considered this. According to the employment contract, the company should inform them two months before dismissing the employees. Still, because the CEO was very upset, he immediately rejected us with two months’ salary. Of course, I am very grateful to that company because I could give myself two months, and as a result of applying to 7 companies, I am now employed. However, I cannot forget that bitter experience. Maybe I shouldn’t feel that way, but that horrible experience still haunts me.

 

 

My advice to you

Dear employers, please try to understand this. Nobody is perfect. I’m not saying we were the best programmers; we were aware of our mistakes. Still, you shouldn’t expect excellent output from underpaid junior developers with poor management and an inexperienced CEO. Experienced managers are not like that; I have met some great CEOs and CEOs and seen their professional demeanor.

It was the worst experience of my career and one of the worst experiences of my life.
Finally, I advise developers not to stay where they are not respected and valued. If I stayed there for another six months, I would be two years behind in my work.