This post's overview:
In this post, I wanted to share with you the best sites for looking for a job in a startup in London (and overall, in the UK) based on my personal experience of living and working in London for 3 years. There are startup jobs in Brighton, Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds and some other cities as well, however, as you can imagine, most startup jobs in the UK are located in London.
There is a saying that once you start working in startup, you would never want to go back to the corporate environment. People want to work for startups for different reasons: it’s either the fun, collaborative environment; being surrounded by young and passionate people or a possibility to own a part of a startup at an early stage.
I had a chance to work for 3 startups in my life: one was a lean startup, but it already had over 300 employees and three offices around the world; another one was a very bureaucratic French startup, which I can’t consider a startup at all, because decisions were taking ages to be implemented and needed five approvals. The last startup was amazing – and how a proper startup in my mind had to look like.
I would like to write a separate post about the pros and cons of working for a startup, especially if you’re considering to start working for one, but aren’t quite sure what to expect. Once it’s ready, I will link to it in this post.
If you’re specifically looking for a job in a startup, then you find this post very useful. Below, you will find the best sites, where you can find positions in startups in London (and the rest of the UK). Without further ado, let’s get started:
Best sites to look for a startup job in London & the UK
1. Angel List
My personal favourite website for finding a job in startups in Angel.co or Angel List. On this platform, startups can create profiles, where they tell a bit more about the idea and story of the company, investment received and plans for the future. Candidates can also create accounts and upload their CVs. What I like is that both candidates and companies can express interest in each other, so sometimes you can just set up a profile, and you will be receiving requests from startups.
The downside of Angel List is that sometimes you match with a company and nothing else happens – e.g. you don’t know whether you expect to message them or they would message you. I matched with a lot of companies, but maybe around half of them just reached out to me to continue a conversation.
On Angel List, you can also find remote jobs all around the world. Just click on the remote job in the settings/preferences, and you will be able to see companies based in the US, Europe and India, who are willing to hire remote candidates.
You can find jobs in any industries and functions, from software development to Marketing and Customer Service.
2. Work in Startups
The website, where I had the most interviews is Work in Startups. Work in Startups has a very basic interface, yet, by default, all the jobs are sorted by date, which is very convenient. You can visit the website every day or every couple of days to see if any new jobs were added. You can also set up a basic account and upload your CV, with which, you can then apply to jobs. Some startups reply almost immediately, so you can find a job in virtually no time!
3. Travel Massive
If you’re looking for a startup job in travel, Travel Massive could be a place to look at. Every week, they send a list of new jobs available worldwide, and they feature a fair bit of travel startups as well. While I personally never had luck with Travel Massive, you never know, maybe you would!
4. LinkedIn
One of the leading job boards and professional social networks is LinkedIn. LinkedIn filtering doesn’t let you tick a startup box; however, you can look by the size of the company as well. However, what I usually do is type “X + startup” where X could be the name of the role you’re looking for, and LinkedIn often returns pretty relevant results for this query.
5. The Talent Pool
Many startups use Talent Pool because it helps them avoid candidate clutter. I personally don’t like this platform that much; however, I know many people who do. You need to set up your candidate profile and fill out all the necessary fields. Then, you need to indicate your desired level of salary and just sit back and wait a couple of days (or months) for the relevant jobs to be sent to your inbox.
You can’t see all available positions on the platform, so only the ones, where Talent Pool thinks you would be suitable, will be sent to your inbox and then, you can apply. In my experience, I’ve seen some decent positions around, however, the communication from TalentPool is somewhat lacking, so you never know, if you’re even being considered for the position or not. Moreover, Talent Pool is focusing on graduate jobs, so there are only a few positions for people with 4+ years of experience.
6. Kandidate
Kandidate is a new website, where you can look for non-technical startups jobs in London. That’s mainly Marketing, Customer Service, Sales and Ops. Kandidate is a talent matching platform, and it works in a similar way as the Talent Pool. You will need to wait to receive offers. If you don’t have any experience, Kandidate might not be the best platform.
7. Hired by startups
Hired by startups is actually a recruitment agency, where you need to submit your CV and you can apply to one of the positions they have listed on the website. They have a simple, yet efficient job search widget, where you can search by keyword, category or region. The main downside is that you won’t see which startups you are applying for.
Another disadvantage is that you need to pass the first check – the member of their team evaluates your CV and decides, whether you are suitable for the job or not. And their opinion might be different from the conclusion of the recruitment team or a manager at the startup plus it adds an unnecessary step to your interview process.
8. Crunchbase
Crunchbase is a platform, where every single respectable startup, who got investment is listed. Moreover, you can identify startups with high potential there. You can’t look for jobs on Crunchbase, but, as I said, you can search for promising startups and then apply to them directly through their website. Sometimes, it’s even more advantageous as many startups prefer direct applications, so they don’t need to pay the recruitment agency.
Alright, so these were the best website for a startup job search in London and the UK! Good luck on your job search and make sure to check the company reviews on Glassdoor (it’s important to verify that the reviews were evenly spread out and not all posted on the same week or day).
Some of my other posts you might like:
How much money do you need to live in London in 2020?
Best districts to live in London