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Ask HN: What's left for early startup engineers as the company grows?

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Ask HN: What's left for early startup engineers as the company grows?

#1

Post by tootall »

Howdy

I joined a startup ~2 years ago as employee #2 (software engineer), and thus I've had the responsibility of essentially building every technical aspect of the company from the ground up, which I loved. Now, the company scaled up (about 45 people) but, instead of being happy, I feel like everything's been taken away from me:

- Technical strategy: I strongly shaped the technical direction of the company defining a lot of critical points, and now they brought in a VP of engineering

- Management: I managed an entire team of 10 people without ever missing a deadline of the whole team, and now they brought in an engineering manager

- Customer facing roles: I was having a lot of customer interaction and support, now they brought in a support engineer and I don't even know who our users are anymore

- Infrastructure management: I took care of building a state-of-the-art scalable and fully automated infrastructure in the public cloud, and now they brought in an operation guy

- Developer: This is the only thing I still do, full time

Essentially, and I understand it's just my ego speaking, I feel like there has not been any career advancement for me. The only benefit has been the gazillion things I learned in this ~2 years journey by doing the above roles.

I've been told that now, since I don't have to worry about the other things, I can focus on what I'm able to do best, just writing code (which I agree, all the tasks I did were less challenging than some critical parts of the code base I wrote from scratch), but still in the "about us" web page of startups just the management is going to be listed and take the credits. Where did I fail to claim my part when the company was growing?

I understand this is a first world rant and and I should just "be happy" it has been a success so far, but still I find it hard and I would very much appreciate the opinion of other people who went through something similar.

Thank you

Re: Ask HN: What's left for early startup engineers as the company grows?

#2

Post by mtmail »

I've heard that before. You were very productive coding, almost too busy and if they promoted you then they would be one good coder short. It was easier to hire somebody fresh with an outside look to think long-term. I expect you will soon be heading a 'special projects' group as a perk to keep you motivated (that group might build a second website or launch in another country or create prototypes so that could be great). The only thing you could have done would be to insist on becoming a/the CTO from the beginning and not let them hire anybody on top. Were you cut for that from day 1? Often investors add pressure to replace parts of the team with 'more experienced' experts, that can also affect founders (being stripped of CEO and president titles).

Re: Ask HN: What's left for early startup engineers as the company grows?

#3

Post by balls187 »

The rub with startups is that leadership may not have experience with developing careers.

From what you've written, it seems like you really don't have a lot of experience developing careers either, which is one reason to bring in an experienced engineering manager. It's not a knock on your skillset managing a 10 person team and delivering. Just a realization that management isn't something you can just quickly learn on the job.

My advice: have a discussion with whomever the new engineering manager is, and explain your career aspirations and the current dilemma you have.

Re: Ask HN: What's left for early startup engineers as the company grows?

#4

Post by frozenport »

Leave.

Be pragmatic: there will be other opportunities which are equally interesting and staying isn't helping. You could be CTO at a different startup. Further, you should be approximately at your zenith at the company and they should be able to provide a strong reference, if you stay dissatisfied your performance and appearance will suffer - along with your potential for future employment.

Also happiness is about the journey (career, parenting, etc). If you're not on a journey you won't be happy!

Re: Ask HN: What's left for early startup engineers as the company grows?

#6

Post by untog »

frozenport wrote: post #4

Leave. Be pragmatic: there will be other opportunities which are equally interesting and staying isn't helping. You could be CTO at a different startup. Further, you should be approximately at your zenith at the company and they should be able to provide a strong reference, if you stay dissatisfied your performance and appearance will suffer - along with your potential for future employment. Also happiness is about t…

Very easy to say, but if you have significant equity (which, as employee #2, you really should) it's a lot more difficult to just step away.

"The journey" is all very well, but if that journey involves checking out for a year while you wait for a payout then so be it.

Re: Ask HN: What's left for early startup engineers as the company grows?

#8

Post by scosman »

At a company with 45 people, all of the roles you mention probably should be dedicated roles/teams. You didn't do anything wrong, you were just successful at growing a company.

If you want to wear a lot of hats, go join another early stage company (the items you mention make an awesome resume). If you want to grow at the current company, pick an area or two (development+strategy or management) and let the ceo know what you are interested in.

Re: Ask HN: What's left for early startup engineers as the company grows?

#9

Post by cheriot »

frozenport wrote: post #4

Leave. Be pragmatic: there will be other opportunities which are equally interesting and staying isn't helping. You could be CTO at a different startup. Further, you should be approximately at your zenith at the company and they should be able to provide a strong reference, if you stay dissatisfied your performance and appearance will suffer - along with your potential for future employment. Also happiness is about t…

He's probably got a 4 year vesting schedule and maybe a more recent evergreen grant with another 4 year vesting schedule. As intended, that's a good incentive to work on the problem before giving up.

The thing missing from the post is a description of what he wants. If it's more recognition, I bet he could talk to the founders and work something out. To them it'll be a justified and free way to keep a great engineer.

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