Working at a big company often makes you a small part of a large machine, which limits your learning and slows your pace of growth compared to creating your own startup where you are responsible for everything.

As head of Google Cloud, I've learned that building an enterprise startup within a large company requires attention to the cultures of both the parent company and the startup.

Founders often struggle with the transition from a tech giant mindset to the scrappy approach needed in startups, which requires extreme resourcefulness and thoughtfulness.

Doing things that don't scale is essential in the early stages of a startup, and founders should expect to look very different from larger competitors.

The advice to do things that don't scale is counterintuitive but provides startups with a unique advantage over larger competitors by fostering deep customer understanding and rapid experimentation.

Paul Graham's essay "Do Things That Don't Scale" transformed Silicon Valley's culture by encouraging startups to focus on immediate problems rather than theoretical scalability issues.

The lessons learned at a big tech company may not apply to startups, as many founders find that their corporate experience is irrelevant compared to their college coursework.

YC encourages startups to do things unscalably at the beginning, which is a significant competitive advantage over larger companies.

From a financial perspective, working at a company like Google is often safer than starting a business, but it may not lead to personal fulfillment for everyone.