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Ask HN: Those who've joined a friend's startup as an employee, how did that go?

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Re: Ask HN: Those who've joined a friend's startup as an employee, how did that go?

#251

Post by jokethrowaway »

Hired a friend and the startup later failed.

Relationship was fine during the startup and after the startup failed but we did another business together and he did some d*ck moves there. Mainly out of being young and inexperienced.

We're still friends but I don't think I'd do business with again.

I did some other ventures with friends and they turned out fine but nothing life changing.

I'd do it again and I'm open to do business with friends. If your friends are honest people you should be able to do a civil business with them. If they can't, I'd rather not have them as friends.

Re: Ask HN: Those who've joined a friend's startup as an employee, how did that go?

#252

Post by naosfn »

Didn't go well. Really turned me off of startups in general after the experience of working there.

Main take aways:

    - 98% of venture capitalists are worthless.

    - Constantly "pivoting" the company until you find MVP is celebrated as a viable strategy when in fact it is not and leads to burn out.

    - Everything is a P0 which will have you working incessantly, at a lower wage, for something that will probably be thrown away

Re: Ask HN: Those who've joined a friend's startup as an employee, how did that go?

#253

Post by ozim »

wahnfrieden wrote: post #232
ozim wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who say: "Anyone giving you a wage while seeking a profit instead of partner equity is taking advantage of you tautologically" assume all startups have huge exit and don't account that equity can actually go down to $0 - that $100 I get today wired to my account does not go to $0 suddenly. Then you might be stuck with equity because there might be no one who will buy it off - or company board won't approve of…

When I say equity over wage I don’t mean no profit sharing either, or no compensation for labor. Go learn about worker cooperative structures in practice. I’m not talking about joining startups on equity alone

My opinion is that getting lower salary for some equity has to be accounted against the fact that equity can go to $0 - yes you might be on ride for unicorn - but most likely not.

Worker cooperative structure sounds like a different thing that I usually read about which is people accepting lower compensation for some equity, which is usually bait and switch to get young talents work for less but for "some future unknown riches".

Getting equity has to be done with enough due diligence and by people who understand the downsides. People who can do due diligence and understand the downsides will most likely rather get their money in the bank unless it is really good deal to get equity.

Re: Ask HN: Those who've joined a friend's startup as an employee, how did that go?

#254

Post by machomaster »

wifipunk wrote: post #242
robertlagrant wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How was it established?

They mean it was established by the CEO's experience with him as an engineer. To the company it was never, and as high a recommendation as the CEO would be; most people would agree they did the right thing. Unless you're hired before a hiring manager or whomever is doing the hiring you should follow the process. If you treat it like a joke because you feel entitled by your connections then be willing to accept the ou…

You are describing the HR person's ego trip.

That person should be fired, for being unprofessional and for inability to adapt to a trivial non-standard situation ("normally we test the applicant's technical competency with a take-home test; now it already has been established; so I need to stop wasting everybody's time and spend my time doing something actually useful".)

Obviously, HR could still be useful in establishing a culture fit, but even then it's pretty much a formality since the CEO worked with and recommended the guy.

Re: Ask HN: Those who've joined a friend's startup as an employee, how did that go?

#255

Post by neilv »

robertlagrant wrote: post #130
neilv wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So anyhow, this guy who I’d worked alongside for years, who’d seen plenty of my code and wanted me to join his company, was going to make me do this homework to get an offer. Had your friend delegated the engineering hiring decisions/process to someone else, and was trying not to step on their toes? Or friend had instituted the process, and didn't think it would go well with the other people, if you looked like a n…

> Or friend was trying to put you in your employee place (where you had to meet his process), or otherwise was getting a bit full of himself, or a bit sleep-deprived and nutty? This would be a strange take. CEO shouldn't be letting people in on the nod. If hiring is someone else's job, CEO shouldn't be overriding. At best suggesting candidates but saying that it's totally the hiring manager's call. If a candidate did…

It's one possibility, and I would bet money that it happens sometimes. I itemized it last because it seems the least-likely of those possibilities.

I think it's kinda intuitive that this could happen. Startups tend to require early people to figure out and apply a ton of diverse skills. You can guess many founders will think "I'm hiring my friend, and I don't know how the power dynamic will work out". And some percentage of those will then think, "...so I should establish from the start that they're the employee, to avoid problems later." And from there you get the dance-for-our-approval tests that so many techbros have cargo-culted.

Re: Ask HN: Those who've joined a friend's startup as an employee, how did that go?

#256

Post by drpgq »

catlifeonmars wrote: post #187
xrd wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's wild that you said that amount because that was exactly the number. I have other friendships that have been tested for similar amounts that have survived. But, it leaves a mark. I had an ex-employee who worked for me under starvation wages in a startup long ago. He was upset about that and some tax implications, and brought it up with me. I gave him a smallish lump sum and enabled him to put a down payment on a…

Wow. $20k seems like a paltry sum to end a friendship over.

An interesting thought experiment to me is how much I would be willing to spend to preserve a friendship. Various situations over the past few years, including some businesses with friends made me think about hypotheticals.

Re: Ask HN: Those who've joined a friend's startup as an employee, how did that go?

#257

Post by gmoss »

I was the first technical hire 8 years ago, we'd been friends for over ten years prior. We had some tensions and disagreements in the beginning when the company was small, but as his CEO role took him away from engineering and as I got into progressively lower level backend work, that all ironed out.

I'm still happily working as an IC despite all the attempts to get me to accept a management roll, and we still have a great friendship and a lot of trust (though we live in different countries now and don't see each other very often). Being an unquestionably-trusted IC with a direct line to the CEO and all the other upper management is pretty sweet, and though the salary is maybe 2-3x lower than I could get at some other places I wouldn't trade what I have here away for that.

Re: Ask HN: Those who've joined a friend's startup as an employee, how did that go?

#258

Post by selimthegrim »

financltravsty wrote: post #109
bruce511 wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an employer, I'll push back on this. I'll start by saying that if you want equity, then by all means seek out jobs that provide equity. In mu experience, people don't want equity as much as they want a living wage. They want a proper salary, every month, not some mythical payday in the future. If you can find a place that does both, thats fantastic. Incidentally if you have meaningful equity that comes with a bunc…

I’ll push back on everyone here: if you’re looking for a stable living wage, you’re a fool — especially in tech. The economy is cyclical. Tech runs on speculation and (used to) on lax tax rules. Likewise, hiring is based on asinine processes, asinine vogues of fashion, and asinine practices. At any moment in time you could be made persona non-grata in tech. If you joined tech for the passion of if, and you’re not ind…

>no different than doing a physics PhD while inhabiting the middle or lower classes.

such PhDs are funded last I checked.

Re: Ask HN: Those who've joined a friend's startup as an employee, how did that go?

#259

Post by selimthegrim »

machomaster wrote: post #165
golly_ned wrote: post #58

Two similar situations: - a coworker and close friend was moving into management. Went poorly. We both left within six months. We had worked incredibly well together as peers. - I joined a startup where, unbeknownst to me, the engineer who became CTO and an early hire were best friends since college. The early hire became an engineering director. He was awful. His reports knew it. We had to humor him and stop him fro…

What is CP?

Child porn.

Re: Ask HN: Those who've joined a friend's startup as an employee, how did that go?

#260

Post by bdjsiqoocwk »

jurschreuder wrote: post #249

I joined the new startup of my sister's boyfriend. He previously founded and was CTO of one of the top 50 biggest tech companies. I now never speak to him or my sister anymore. Only fights and blocked social media accounts and have given up ever seeing my sister again. So at least for family: Don't do it. It's not that big of a problem to never see a specific friend again but they have driven me out of my mom's side…

I'm curious about this. What happened that you "can't" see your sister? Have you tried, or is this one of those situations where you're both too proud to admit it?
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