Ask HN: Why did every YC startup move to hiring Founding Engineers?

#1

Post by ciguy » Thu, Feb 06, 2025, 8:46 PM UTC

It seems like every HN Hiring post over the last 6 to 12 months is for "Founding Engineers". When you read the job ads, what they are actually looking for is a unicorn engineer who can build the entire product including Backend, FrontEnd and DevOps while also being an AI domain expert and any number of other demands.

This post is a perfect example of this: https://www.ycombinator.com/companies/roe-ai/jobs/CZrzxk6-founding-engineer

They usually offer 0.25% to 2.0% equity and 150k to 200k per year.

I guess I am curious if there is a reason they all started doing this at the same time? Was there some kind of YC memo telling them to do this?

Why would someone with those skills and qualifications go work for a startup building their entire product for 2% or less vs just building it for themselves and retaining 100% equity?

This whole trend seems super misguided and somewhat exploitative from the outside but it must be working if they are all doing it?

Re: Ask HN: Why did every YC startup move to hiring Founding Engineers?

#2

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Feb 06, 2025, 8:49 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Why did every YC startup move to hiring Founding Engineers?

#3

Post by andrewfromx » Thu, Feb 06, 2025, 8:51 PM UTC

"Why would someone with those skills and qualifications go work for a startup building their entire product for 2% or less vs just building it for themselves and retaining 100% equity?" Oh boy, tried that many many times. Turns out 100% of 0 is BTW if anyone is going to apply to one of these remember that 2% max equity is NOT REALLY THE MAX. Ask for 10% and slowly work down and settle for 6%.

Re: Ask HN: Why did every YC startup move to hiring Founding Engineers?

#4

Post by codingdave » Thu, Feb 06, 2025, 8:58 PM UTC

> Why would someone with those skills and qualifications...

Well, because there is more to building a business than code? I certainly know engineers who can be a one-man wrecking crew to build out an initial product. But I don't know any of them who also want to do sales and marketing, accounting and fundraising, HR and the legal side of things.

As far as why they are called "Founding Engineers"... meh, it is just a title, and trends in titles come and go.

Re: Ask HN: Why did every YC startup move to hiring Founding Engineers?

#5

Post by ciguy » Thu, Feb 06, 2025, 9:07 PM UTC

codingdave wrote: post #4

> Why would someone with those skills and qualifications... Well, because there is more to building a business than code? I certainly know engineers who can be a one-man wrecking crew to build out an initial product. But I don't know any of them who also want to do sales and marketing, accounting and fundraising, HR and the legal side of things. As far as why they are called "Founding Engineers"... meh, it is just a…

Sure but this seems a bit hypocritical when YC prefers and recommends having 2 technical founders over 1 technical and one business oriented founder. One of their major premises is that it's easy to teach sales and marketing to an engineer but not easy to teach engineering to a non-technical person. In these cases it seems reversed where the founders are not technical and are hiring someone to build the whole product.

Re: Ask HN: Why did every YC startup move to hiring Founding Engineers?

#6

Post by marssaxman » Thu, Feb 06, 2025, 9:07 PM UTC

> just building it for themselves and retaining 100% equity

I tried that once, and once was enough. It's not very rewarding to own 100% equity in a failed startup, especially when it failed because you were too focused on building the product to also build the business around it.

Re: Ask HN: Why did every YC startup move to hiring Founding Engineers?

#7

Post by ciguy » Thu, Feb 06, 2025, 9:08 PM UTC

andrewfromx wrote: post #3

"Why would someone with those skills and qualifications go work for a startup building their entire product for 2% or less vs just building it for themselves and retaining 100% equity?" Oh boy, tried that many many times. Turns out 100% of 0 is BTW if anyone is going to apply to one of these remember that 2% max equity is NOT REALLY THE MAX. Ask for 10% and slowly work down and settle for 6%.

Certainly possible, but one of the core premises of YC is that it's easy for technical people to learn sales and marketing but the inverse is not true. So this whole trend seems weird and a bit hypocritical. I'm more curious whether it's working and if they are actually finding people that meet these insane qualifications for relatively meager salaries and equity.

Re: Ask HN: Why did every YC startup move to hiring Founding Engineers?

#8

Post by ciguy » Thu, Feb 06, 2025, 9:09 PM UTC

marssaxman wrote: post #6

> just building it for themselves and retaining 100% equity I tried that once, and once was enough. It's not very rewarding to own 100% equity in a failed startup, especially when it failed because you were too focused on building the product to also build the business around it.

Fair enough but wouldn't it make sense to find a co-founder vs getting paid a relatively small amount to build someone else's thing?

Re: Ask HN: Why did every YC startup move to hiring Founding Engineers?

#9

Post by Terr_ » Thu, Feb 06, 2025, 9:15 PM UTC

andrewfromx wrote: post #3

"Why would someone with those skills and qualifications go work for a startup building their entire product for 2% or less vs just building it for themselves and retaining 100% equity?" Oh boy, tried that many many times. Turns out 100% of 0 is BTW if anyone is going to apply to one of these remember that 2% max equity is NOT REALLY THE MAX. Ask for 10% and slowly work down and settle for 6%.

> remember that 2% max equity is NOT REALLY THE MAX. Ask for 10% and slowly work down and settle for 6%.

At first I thought this was going to end with a caution about not being protected from stock dilution.

Re: Ask HN: Why did every YC startup move to hiring Founding Engineers?

#10

Post by jollyllama » Thu, Feb 06, 2025, 10:12 PM UTC

> When you read the job ads, what they are actually looking for is a unicorn engineer who can build the entire product including Backend, FrontEnd and DevOps while also being an AI domain expert and any number of other demands.

Tangent, but is there a descriptor for that in a traditional corporate setting?