Does working as software engineer for a company make life a 'living hell'? Shall I consider entrepreneurship? What should a student need to know if want to become an entrepreneur?

It isn't just you. It is just some companies. Many, in fact. Find a better company.

Your life won't be a living hell. This is an exaggeration propagated mostly by the SV crowd who clearly hasn't ever had to worry about living in a country with a financial climate that makes you appreciate basic things that we take for granted such as a monthly paycheck. A software engineer position comes with a great compensation, has great hours (usually flexible) and if you don't like your job, you can switch jobs pretty easily. That said, if you are the kind of guy who likes to be challenged to his limits on a day to day basis and loves living with uncertainty, then you probably won't be very happy getting a regular paycheck and a moderately challenging job at a BigCo and you'd be happier with entrepreneurship. The things you should focus on right now is getting better and better at your chosen major  - Computer Science. Being good at that and you'll have a lot easier time either job hunting or starting your tech company.

It's not that easy either of the ways. You are not the only one who is feeling so. Every software professional comes across that feeling at some point of time in his life, thanks to the start-up culture(many soft-pros have made it large by taking up entrepreneurship so the feeling of making it large does comes in.). First gain some experience of any organizational flow, from where does the money pour in, budget, and all other considerations that you need to look upon before getting into entrepreneurship. Before taking up all this, make your thoughts very clear, there must be no second thoughts. Clarity of thought is one value that every entrepreneur possesses and if you think that you'll lead a comfortable life after you take up entrepreneurship then you are mistaken. The time after you complete your graduation is the most suitable time, as that is the most suitable time to take risks. At least for the first few years of your life are going to be a living hell. You'll have difficult times trying to sleep, but you know the magic happens out of your comfort zone.  As a student right now, put every moment of your life into learning things and not just learning, but putting them into experience. And if you are a student I would suggest you to make as many friends as you can, party as much as you can(do not get carried maintain your GPA). Because once you get out of college you don't make friends, they are either your colleagues, partners or associates but not friends. So learn but do not forget to enjoy. Be sincere but not serious.

It became a trend now a days to degrade the image of software engineers here. Many of them (ppl who have negative feeling about it) didn't even seen or experienced such kind of life, they also claims their mark. In my opinion, it is not the case always. As myself being a software engineer, I can say my life is good, interesting. Again, if u r not enjoying, take some time, find out ur interests n think how can u perceive that as a profession being an entrepreneur.. but before that don't think ur life at soft company sucks only because people says that..

Just read the first answer to the question "" and you will realize how does it feels to be an entrepreneur. Millions of people are working a software engineer because it is one of the most rewarding jobs available. That does not mean you should not look entrepreneurship as an option, but just don't get scared by this field. If you like programming, then it's fun, provides better work satisfaction, and pays you well.

It seems all the answers have negative shade. While I agree that the other answers are not untrue, lets assume the guy or the girl asking this question is not a moron who want to make quick cash by selling snake oil. Apart from this, anyone who has ever worked in software development for sufficient of time have always thought of building something of one's own. They also irrationally believe that their job sucks. So, it sounds pretty important to me to answer this question from a different perspective. What is a "living hell"? I assume you want do some meaningful work as an entrepreneur and just not be another brick in the wall* in a big company. I assume by 'living hell', you mean all the corporate culture drama, a monotonous work which you do not know the impact of. A sedentary life where you wake up, go to work, come home to sleep. Your work is hard and meaningless (to you) but you pretend to be proud of it. Your wife, parents, neighbors, government and dog love you for that. Every weekend you go to the mall to buy stuffs that you do not need. You do things because your peers are doing the same. You take the same insurance policies as your colleagues to save some income tax. Once a year, you go to same holiday spot where everyone else went in the past. You save money for a 2BHK apartment in a fast growing suburb so that you can retire there and blog about how green it was the other side*. You do not know why you are doing something, you are basically copying everyone's life to retire your old body safely in cemetery where your daughter would come once a year. You will live an easy, boring and safe life. You will be the no-one of the society who argues over why 's Batman is not the worst Batman movie. If this is a "living hell" to you, you might want want to know what it takes to be an entrepreneur... Should you consider entrepreneurship? I know a couple of my friends who started their own companies right after the school, and they are living very satisfactory life. I know people who quit their highly paying job after a year or two, and started working on an idea and they are making news. I know many people, including me, who weren't successful enough in their entrepreneurial stint even when they started it after quite some experience in the domain. So, to all people who are telling you "get experience", "starting-up is hard as hell", "you are only coming through in waves"*, or "it is a new fashion", I say if you ever want to consider entrepreneurship, do it as early in your life as possible. The more time passes, the more the responsibilities you will own. You will get married, you will have mortgage to pay, you will have car loan, you may have your parents to support. If you delay further, you will have kids, their education, health etc. Your own life will be so cumbersome that you would not be able to risk financials. So, if you want to start, now is the best time. This brings me to your last question: What are the things that you should take care of? It is an liberating experience that you have control over the decisions that you might want to make to handle your business. It all boils down to a couple of questions: How passionate are you? Entrepreneurship is not about the product. In your case, it is not all about building a software that works. It is about achieving the vision through the product. There will be tough times. You may not have money to continue. People may hate your product. It may not be going the way you expected. A technical breakthrough could make your product obsolete. You will not survive these shocks, if you are in business just for the moolah. You must be passionate enough about your vision to stay strong in face of adversities and take appropriate action to survive through. Do you have a vision? I did not say idea. I said vision. Vision is something you achieve through implementation of ideas. Vision does not have to be holy. It could be as simple as to have all the ivy league colleges into a social network. You could build a Facebook for that or you could build a Whatsapp for that. The implementation is moot. Are you a risk taker? Know it for the fact that you might end up with lot less money than your lowest earning classmate, you may end up with a "jack of all trades, master of none" situation. You should also know that you might be working 10x harder than your 's investment banker friend to earn 10x lower income. But hey, there is a bright side to it. You might end up into a multimillionaire or a billionaire in five years. You will be more satisfied than any of your acquaintances. You will have more stories to tell. If you fit on all these criteria you are good to go. You do not need to worry about: where the investment will come from, what technology you should know, what is your fallback. All these questions can be answered if you search it. Whatever you do, good luck from me. And hey, if the worst does happen to you, you can always go back to having a cog-in-the-wheel job. -- * references.

Work is hard.  Different people like different things.  What's hell to you may be heaven to someone else, and vice versa.  You have different companies, and different people. Part of life is just doing things and seeing how it works. The thing about entrepreneurship is that it's pretty well established that if you are an entrepreneur, you will work harder for less money than if you work for a company.  However, because it's your own company, you can have a bit more freedom and control. But it's still a *LOT* of work.  A lot of doing your own company is brutal, grinding work, and a lot of it involves begging for money.  Whether this is hell or heaven for you depends on your personality, and often it's impossible to figure what what happens until you try it.

If you want to become a software entrepreneur I highly recommend http://thefoundation.com. I'm an alumni from the program and I just got my first customer at $500 for software that doesn't exist yet. I was a web developer but I'll be outsourcing the development with the presales I get from more customers (who are paying twelve months in advance in exchange for a big discount). Anyway, going through this program totally changed the way I think about business and I've made some amazing friends as well. The community is the best part of it all. If you're serious about entrepreneurship you at least need to watch the free videos they put out and learn from their marketing.