Thread: Career advice: switching from small business to corporate job

I need a career advice regarding working as a senior software engineer
in a corporation.

I am a java developer and I have always worked as employee in very
small flat-hierarchy companies or as founder in 2-3 people startups.
As such, I am used to take care of a very diverse range of issues
apart from code development, from requirements gathering to technology
R&D, database design, system administration, integration etc.

My guess is that if I had chosen a career path in a big corporation, I
would have focused more on programming and I would have learned a more
specialized skill set, big team methodologies (?), and gathered much
more experience as developer rather than do-all.

Now I am 38 years old, I have 13 years of working experience in Italy,
and would like to try a new challenge moving towards a corporate job
in Europe or North/South America. I would like to know your opinion
and advice regarding how to do this.

I wonder if my flexibility could be appreciated in that environment or
if I have to start from a junior position because I am not
specialized.
Also I am thinking if I should pursue a management position, where a
horizontal rather then vertical knowledge would be needed, but I have
the drawback of not knowing the corporate culture and mindset.

Thank you very much for your attention.

also you might want to condition your lips cause from my experience corp. jobs require a good amount of butt kissing and ive also found that most here in the US want you to have a BS degree in computer science or so with your experience...good luck though

Aledino,
The quickest way to get your foot in the door with any corporate company is to start off on contract. The company I recruit for uses contractors first before hiring them on as FTE's. They like to "try before they buy." You can negotiate a solid rate for yourself and add at least a year of corporate experience to your resume.

Hey Kevin,

I appreciate the feedback. Just as I received an e-mail about your reply, he will receive a notification of mine. I've hired candidates that have posted on forums up to a year old...in my line of work, that candidate that wasn't a fit 6 months maybe a fit now. Not to mention others who may see my post and will message about potential opportunities. I am working diligently to respond to as many career-related threads as I can.