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With my move west, one of the biggest changes with Enter Venture will be better insight into what it’s like working for a startup. After all, working with entrepreneurs is a great way for an early entrepreneur to learn the ropes.

First, though, you need to get a startup job. Here are 10 sites (in no particular order) that I found helpful in my startup job search:

1. Doostang - Doostang may be the exclusive career community for top young professionals (whatever that means), but it’s also a great place to find startup jobs. A lot of startups are created by ex-young professionals, ergo, ex-young professionals are already on registered with the exclusive career community for top young professionals. They want you to join them in their “ex” status.

2. LinkedIn - For those of you that live by the “getting a job is all about who you know” mantra, well, you probably don’t work at a startup. With LinkedIn, “who you know” certainly helps you get started, and that’s sort of comforting.

3. Startuply - Startuply is quickly becoming the it place for listing startup jobs. A lot of the blog job boards further down in this list have 100-200 job postings, not even necessarily all for startups. Startuply currently has just under 1,000 startup jobs listed. They provide background information on the companies, and it sounds like they’re just getting started with their feature set. I have nothing but great things to say for their outreach efforts too. They quickly responded to a bug post I reported, and I was happy to send over a screenshot to help them out.

4. craigslist - This came as a surprise to me too, but craigslist turned out to be a halfway decent option for my startup job search. Startups are pretty tight with their cash, and craigslist has a price and distribution that can’t be beat. There are just two things you need to keep in mind with craigslist. One, there will be hundreds of resumes submitted for every job. Two, because there are hundreds of resumes submitted for every job (including the one you’re applying to), pick only those jobs that fit you perfectly.

5. Crunchboard - TechCrunch’s job board is one of the best places to find startup jobs because TechCrunch is where you go to find startup news. Makes sense, no? (Also, kudos to TechCrunch on the redesign. It’s about time.)

6. 37signals Job Board - 37signals job board is another blog with a great job board, especially if you’re a developer or designer.

7. Silicon Alley Insider Job Board - SAI’s job board is obviously a great place for New York startup jobs, especially with the startup boom in New York. What’s less obvious is that there are a few west coast jobs sprinkled in. You might get lucky with one of these.

8. Authentic Jobs - I’m not sure how I found Authentic Jobs, but I know that I found some of the most interesting opportunities on this site. There’s a mix of freelance jobs you can scope out too.

9. Company Websites - The great thing about applying for startup jobs is that you’re often applying to companies you’ve heard that have websites you’ve actually used. When you read about a new company on TechCrunch, go check out their website to see if they’re hiring. (Hint: They usually are.)

10. Get out, ask questions, meet people, make friends - (OK, I lied, 9 websites and a dose of the real world). You need to do a whole lot more to get a startup job than merely visiting job board sites. This list wouldn’t be complete without mentioning that. I was able to meet a few people during my search and most people were more than happy to send my resume along. People understand what it’s like looking for a job, and if they work with startups they certainly want to see them succeed. Everyone likes playing matchmaker.

(Also, worth checking out even though they helped only minimally in my search were Joel on Software’s Job Board and the Crayola Crayon-looking StartUpers site.)

Update (9/14/08): When I made this list, I focused on the startup job sites that were most helpful for me. It wasn’t a list of all the startup job sites out there. If I had done a bit more research, I would have noticed Sean Aune’s post with 18 Startup Job Sites (damn, 18 is more than 10) to help bolster this list. A lot of these are general sites, but there are a few in here worth mentioning that have some potential:

• CoNotes - I’d never seen this one, but it looks promising. If anyone’s used it, let me know what you think.
• GoBigNetwork - I’m not convinced this is a the best place to find a startup job. It seemed like a better place to find a startup partner or investor. The quality of job postings isn’t as good as some of the other sites in this list eiter.
• Mashable Jobs - The same logic works here as with the TechCrunch job board. It wasn’t as helpful for me, but it likely would be for others.
• nPost - nPost is more strictly technical though there are a few non-technical jobs in here. I used nPost to some success, but it’s more like a Joel On Software job board for startups.
• Venture Loop - Venture Loop lists companies backed by VC firms and so fills a need I mentioned in #10 of my original list. People like playing matchmaker in this industry, especially when they have an interest in that match’s success.

Posted in Entrepreneur, Jobs, Reviews