Ask HN: What to do if you hate working for someone else and arent an entrepreneur?

I resent spending 48 weeks a year in an office and stressing over issues that will only make the company's owners richer but won't change much for me. I say don't change much because a 2-3% raise once in a while is nice, but it's nothing in comparison to the thousands/millions extra it will make the company, while the only result for me is that I get to keep my job and do more of that.

I also have a very hard time feeling any personal pride or accomplishment for helping the company's bottom line. It's not my company, and I really don't feel anything whether they sell more or made a couple millions extra this year because employees worked (unpaid) overtime. My boss getting a new Tesla or yet another house from the extra profits doesn't make me happy.

This thinking is hurting me though because it makes every job I ever had barely tolerable, slowly creeping towards miserable after enough time. I am aware of it but I can't overcome it. I've tried working at startups, and 150-300 people mid-sized companies.

On the other hand, I don't think I'm the entrepreneur type either. I don't have any idea that I'd like to pursue and start building a company around, going through that grind is not something that appeals to me.

Has anyone ever felt this way? What did you do about it and how do you cope with it?

Now, the good thing is until you have enough time, money and feel comfortable taking the plunge into being your own boss you can work on gaining the skills by working for someone else. If you are working at a company that does not conduct additional compensation based on performance leave the company for one that does. You owe nothing to a company that is not properly compensating you for the value you provide, especially as your time increases there and you are a top performer.

There are companies out there or should I say sections within companies (even the big ones) that will normally do the following: Annual raise based on performance, annual bonus based on performance, spot bonuses, quarterly bonuses and increasing your base salary to keep competitive with the market (i.e. if your showing mass improvement beyond what you were originally hired for or your actions keep improving your coworkers productivity you could see your base salary increased by 10 to 20 percent or more to better place your skills and talents within the company and insure you are being properly compensated).

A company that cares about attracting top talent, growing and retaining top talent will properly compensate you to where you could technically become rich within (within reason of their income and the value you bring to the table) a few years of working there. As the good companies see that the value you bring to the company increases their bottom line and will make sure to keep your pockets filled with cash so you do not have to worry about it and can spend time doing what you do and have fun doing it.

I would recommend you do some searching for areas near you and compare your skills, talents and abilities to what the average household incomes are near your next possible employer - https://www.incomebyzipcode.com/

Insure that what you ask for in salary is a minimum of what the average household income is for the zip code of your employer. Also ask about compensation based on performance and how any bonuses, raises or salary adjustments are calculated. If the potential employer looks at you funny and doesn't know what your talking about move on to the next potential employer until you find one that does not just pay a base salary and does raises but also pays bonuses based on performance.

What about working as early employee or a co-founder on a new venture? It won't be as hard as being the founder and CEO, but you'll still exchange some stability and guaranteed reward right now for a chance of greater reward in the future - and you'll be able to see direct results of your actions on the whole company and your stake in it.