StartUpHire says venture-backed startups really do create jobs

May 20, 2009 | Anthony Ha | Comments | |

When entrepreneurs and venture capitalists ask for better treatment from the government, they love to talk about how startups create jobs. But can small companies really make a difference in the bigger landscape? Well, a study from the Kauffman Foundation earlier this year says they do. And now the National Venture Capital Association is teaming up with StartUpHire, a job site for venture-backed companies, to track how many jobs startups are creating.

As a group that lobbies for VC-friendly legislation, it’s clear why the NVCA wants as much data as possible showing that legislators need to care about the well-being of startups, and therefore about venture firms. Job listings on just one site aren’t exactly a scientific measurement, but they can help the NVCA see patterns over time (say, in response to a specific piece of legislation) without having to repeatedly conduct expensive studies of its own.

So what does the startup job market look like right now? StartUpHire says it currently lists more than 10,000 jobs at 2,500 companies. (Startuply, another job site for startups, lists 1,037 jobs at 957 startups.) Geographically, 37 percent of those jobs are in California. In terms of industry, 31 percent are in software.

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About the Author, Anthony Ha

Anthony is VentureBeat's assistant editor, as well as its reporter on enterprise technology, cloud computing, and tech policy. Before joining VentureBeat in 2008, Anthony worked at the Hollister Free Lance, where he won awards from the California Newspaper Publishers Association for breaking news coverage and writing. He attended Stanford University and now lives in San Francisco. Reach him at anthony@venturebeat.com. You can also follow Anthony on Twitter.

  • Nice post - thanks for mentioning Startuply, too. We might not have enough jobs to give a statistically relevant sample re: employment trends, but I can say that startups *are* hiring. We're also seeing in the neighborhood of 8,000 applications per month via Startuply, and - anecdotally at least - a strong signal:noise ratio.

    So: go work at a startup!
  • Mike G
    These are great initiatives and services. Thanks for helping to get the word out on the openings to those looking. Win-win for everyone, especially in this climate.

    As an additional source of opportunities, for those interested in openings at Highland-backed companies, we launched our Career Network service back in 2005. It lists permanent positions and also includes a number of summer internships for university students. The openings can be found at www.hcp.com/careers.
  • Phil
    Along the lines of what Mike G mentioned at Highlands, I've been searching for jobs at Sequoia Capital and Kleiner Perkins sites directly with great response from the companies. It looks like those sites might be powered by another company in this space called Ventureloop or Hireloop. Anyway, glad to see jobs are still "hot" in the startup space and also glad to see that VC-backed IPOs are starting to happen again