Mike Duchen lives in Boulder, Colorado and is Regional Director for a travel start-up company. In his spare time, Mike is passionate about helping others and volunteering for cancer non-profits. When Mike is seeking guidance and advice in his career, he is thankful to have his brother David as a sounding board for his crazy and creative ideas.

If you’ve ever sat through any entrepreneurship classes in college, the professors probably have taken you through all the steps it takes to start a business. By the time you graduate, you are ready to take on the world and start your own company. Then something crazy happens. You get a job at a start-up, show up for your first day of work, and you find out that you know, in fact, know nothing.

This doesn’t necessarily mean that you will always know nothing, though, and I’ve found that within a short period of time while working for a small company, I’ve gotten exposure to numerous aspects of the business. When I started I started in my current position at the end of July, there was a grand total of three people in the office — well three and a half if you count our office dog Daisy.

Upon arriving for my first day at work, I quickly learned that I would be doing everything from market research and building sales leads to literally building our desks. My job description read “everything”, and I was so excited to be part of the new company that it was hard to sleep at night. Three months into the job, still helping build desks but also going on business trips to Las Vegas, I have learned more than I could have imagined.  I understand I’m still a far cry from knowing all the answers, but there are five things I think are important for all Gen-Y’s to think about if they want to work for a start-up or start a business.

Make Friends With Mistakes

…and don’t be afraid to ask dumb questions. I have learned countless lessons from the President of my company – trust me, some of my questions have been wild.  Whether it is how to approach clients or when to shut up, start-ups let you work closely with the person in charge, so take every opportunity you can to learn from him or her.

Own Your Work

Take initiative. If you want to do something for the company, speak up and don’t be afraid to take risks. Your boss will begin to see where your passions are and there is a good chance you will get to work on it and help build the infrastructure.

Network

Network with as many people from as many industries as possible. Be willing to do favors for people; karma goes a long way and you never know when you might need their help. These favors can be as complicated as helping connect someone with a company that they are trying to reach for new business opportunities, or as simple as meeting someone for coffee. Remember that most people at start-ups are all in the fight together and want to help each other as much as possible.

Create the Inner-Cricle

Begin to surround yourself with the best team of people that you can possibly find. Not only do you typically share a very small space with these people but you’ll also want the best people possible to sit down with in a room and hash out ideas. I’ve learned that you must have the right people that are willing to do anything that the company needs because you never know what is just around the corner.  Especially in start-ups, if you work with lazy people, it sucks 10x more because that means that you have to pick up all the work they are leaving for you to do. Luckily, my team is great and we have Daisy as back-up in case anyone slacks off.

Laugh

Keep a sense of humor and go to your local coffee shop and buy the biggest reusable coffee mug you can find. You will need both!