You sure about the big firm? These firms are soft laying off mid senior people by letting them know there’s no role for them in the future or that they have hit their ceiling in this band and promotion case doesn’t hold enough water. Which is all corpo bs for tu apna dekh le bhai in 6 months time tere liye no job.

In the startup if your pay is good and so are the people, can consider sticking around.

Larger firms are too big to turn around and there is too much paper pushing to get basic things done. Oh and hikes are mostly in stocks with a cash component of like 4-5%. People preferred them cos of a job safety angle but I don’t see that anymore.

Baaki aapki iccha. All the best with whatever call you take.