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Ask HN: Offer to join a startup. Is this deal good?

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Re: Ask HN: Offer to join a startup. Is this deal good?

#11

Post by us »

mindcrime wrote: post #4

Doesn't sound like much of a deal to me. And the reason I say so is because my theory is this: There's no reason to join a startup except to get rich, or to change the world (or both.) If you wanted a "competitive salary" you could go work for Oracle or IBM or Cisco or somebody and get that. So why join the startup at all, unless you're going to make big bank, or unless you just really, really believe in their idea?…

The part you left out for joining a startup that is also important is the learning experience. Besides getting rich and changing the world, the experience itself is valuable. You can go on to find riches and change the world later. I wouldn't come into a startup expecting either/or.

Re: Ask HN: Offer to join a startup. Is this deal good?

#12

Post by transmit101 »

Personally I would expect to get a salary much closer to market-rate than "lodging and food plus some" from a company with $1m funding - especially if I was to be the lead developer and first employee.

I would then consider 1-2% equity to be a not-unexpected bonus/incentive above-and-beyond.

Difficult to be sure without knowing the full circumstances, but it sounds like a poor deal from what you've said.

Re: Ask HN: Offer to join a startup. Is this deal good?

#14

Post by keefe »

pittip wrote: post #7
mindcrime wrote: post #4

Doesn't sound like much of a deal to me. And the reason I say so is because my theory is this: There's no reason to join a startup except to get rich, or to change the world (or both.) If you wanted a "competitive salary" you could go work for Oracle or IBM or Cisco or somebody and get that. So why join the startup at all, unless you're going to make big bank, or unless you just really, really believe in their idea?…

What is this x% which will make the deal sweet?

10%?

The thing is like, you're talking a profit of like 114K on the stock options and you're going to be doing like, insane amounts of work. 100K is fairly typical, normal developer salary, right? Unless I misread the deal, I'd never do this, you could go for a 120K job and not be gambling on options at all and start having a good lifestyle right now or you could take a regular developer job and some contract on the weekends and probably work less hours in either case...

Re: Ask HN: Offer to join a startup. Is this deal good?

#15

Post by mindcrime »

us wrote: post #11
mindcrime wrote: post #4

Doesn't sound like much of a deal to me. And the reason I say so is because my theory is this: There's no reason to join a startup except to get rich, or to change the world (or both.) If you wanted a "competitive salary" you could go work for Oracle or IBM or Cisco or somebody and get that. So why join the startup at all, unless you're going to make big bank, or unless you just really, really believe in their idea?…

The part you left out for joining a startup that is also important is the learning experience. Besides getting rich and changing the world, the experience itself is valuable. You can go on to find riches and change the world later. I wouldn't come into a startup expecting either/or.

Fair enough. If I were younger, I'd probably be looking at it more from that perspective. :-)

Re: Ask HN: Offer to join a startup. Is this deal good?

#16

Post by mindcrime »

pittip wrote: post #7
mindcrime wrote: post #4

Doesn't sound like much of a deal to me. And the reason I say so is because my theory is this: There's no reason to join a startup except to get rich, or to change the world (or both.) If you wanted a "competitive salary" you could go work for Oracle or IBM or Cisco or somebody and get that. So why join the startup at all, unless you're going to make big bank, or unless you just really, really believe in their idea?…

What is this x% which will make the deal sweet?

It depends on your goals and on how big you believe the company will ultimately be, and how likely you think it is to succeed, among other things.

Let's say your goal is to have "FU money." And let's say that, for you, "FU money" is, say, $4 million USD. If you believe the company will eventually be a $400 million dollar company, then 1% equity achieves your goal if the dream materializes as planned. If you only see the company as a $4 million company, then, well, the math doesn't really work out.

And note that I'm intentionally generalizing here and ignoring taxes and other factors. I'm also talking about an outright stock grant, not an option scenario. Options aren't necessarily bad, but I'd think that as the first hire and - if I understand correctly - the person who will be responsible for building (all|most) of the initial product, you should be getting some equity outright.

Re: Ask HN: Offer to join a startup. Is this deal good?

#19

Post by pittip »

amorphid wrote: post #17

I'm a startup recruiter in San Francisco. My two cents is that it sounds like a good deal if you like the company's mission and you want to be an employee.

Even considering the fact that I will be the first employee, leading the tech efforts, and probably making most of the product all by myself.

I do like the idea but its too early for me to be attached to it.

Re: Ask HN: Offer to join a startup. Is this deal good?

#20

Post by pittip »

pg wrote: post #6
pittip wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its in fact a single, non-hacker founder. The investors seem to be bullish though.

Are you hearing about their bullishness from him or them? And are they prominent investors, or noobs?

The company isn't a YC company. But the investors ar quite prominent people.
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