I am working at Udacity right now, it feels good.
Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?
581–590 of 968 posts
Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?
#582Earlier quoted context omitted.
But the Big5 have tons of locations. Amazon in particular has tech centers in places like Phoenix and Detroit, while Google is in Chicago. Microsoft is even in Fargo! Unless you want to be a digital nomad I guess. Then it’s probably not ideal, but I do know some fully remote positions exist at the L6 level at Amazon.
> But the Big5 have tons of locations Name one Big5 job in the entire U.S. south. Or at least one that pays as well as them. There aren’t any.
Then don't live in the south. You'll get paid more, the weather will be nicer, and you'll meet less numbskulls with confederate flags painted on the hood of their trucks. Win/win/win.
Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?
#583Just a few cons.... The big players have drastically pushed up developer comp. The "maybe" money that might come from a best-case startup exit isn't holding up well against the RSUs of the big players. I have friends pushing total comp north of 400K / year at the usual suspect companies. Over a five-year-span-till-liquidity your "maybe" money is competing against a near-guaranteed $2M in comp. Equity grants for early…
Take that view with a huge grain of salt. Nobody is denying that someone, somewhere is making $400k as a software engineer, but we are talking outlier employees at outlier companies. You’re not getting this as a medium level rank and file engineer, or at a non-FAANG company. This whole “software engineers make $400k” trope seems to have taken on a life of its own. Every time salary comes up here, these guys come out…
You literally have no idea what you're talking about. Every one of my friends who is a senior software engineer, including myself, at a decent-sized company has a total compensation between $300-400k per year. One of my good friends has a total comp of $650k, with almost $300k base salary. I have friends at Facebook, Google, Uber, Airbnb, Apple, etc. We all share compensation information with each other.
My friend at a startup is ready to quit because he's only paid $170k for the last 5 years and he regrets not staying at Apple because the shares he left on the table were worth over $1M now. He is now 0/2 in startups, both of which you have heard of, and he's very frustrated.
Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?
#584Earlier quoted context omitted.
FAANGS give you RSUs, which are cash equivalent. When I am referring to 400K, I am referring to "total cash in hand" at the end of the year. Generally the comp you get quoted when you get hired is $200K base + $200K in RSUs based on hire date's stock price. So in today's frothy stock market, you would at least earn $400K and possibly more.
200K in RSU's per year or over 4 years?
If their base is 200k? Then it's 200k per year RSUs (800k 4-year grant)
Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?
#585[deleted]
Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?
#586I think the biggest problem is transparency, which leads to wrong expectations. As a 3-time startup employee, people always told me I should expect a pay cut by going to a startup. But how much? When I received a Series A startup offer and a FANG offer at the same time, I couldn't evaluate them side-by-side because I had no idea how much startup equity was worth. I negotiated hard and got surprising results, which le…
HiringPlan is great! Tools like that are not only helpful to companies, but also should lead to fairer compensation for employees.
Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?
#587I worked at a YC startup with a pretty good exit.
I was employee #40. I made about $100,000. The co-founders made about $100 million each. If I joined a FANG, I would have been granted $500,000 in RSUs, and they would have tripled in price during the time I was at the YC startup. Unless you turn into another Uber, the vast majority of wealth goes to founders.
Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?
#588Earlier quoted context omitted.
Respectfully, if you don’t like the split, the clear answer is to be a founder. The option is available to all, but very few take it. For really good reasons.
The point is that startups are not competitive in recruiting good talent, and they go to the large companies.
I disagree- I’m really good. They just have a very large hammer they swing. Anybody can get good results with the resources they bring to bear. Getting good results with jack shit takes talent, haha.
The answer is not and will never be writing bigger checks with money you don’t have. It’s getting real up close and personal with your team and figuring out a way for everybody to win. If folks want to ride my ride, that’s super, but most cats don’t really have a taste for my risk and work profile. Where I excel is professional development and lifestyle. I can move the needle for people there.
Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?
#589Earlier quoted context omitted.
Very interesting comment. May I ask a quick clarifying question? When you say "the series-A guys are offering the same stock (roughly) as the series-D", what units are you comparing them in? Number of shares? Percentage of the company? Estimated $ value of the shares (and if so, how calculated)?
The number of shares. One can argue that early startup shares are less diluted and thus comprise a bigger piece of the company, but the risk is disproportional to dilution. When evaluating an offer, you just multiply this number to the projected IPO price given the comparable (same industry, company size, etc) IPOs recently.
FWIW, I wouldn't recommend using the number of shares as the benchmark for comparing offers (across any two companies, startups or otherwise).
Actual share counts are quite arbitrary. It's common for startups that are going public to do a 10 to 1 stock split shortly beforehand. Using your algorithm, an offer from that company would 10x more valuable the day after the split!
Much better would be to compare the expected value, by multiplying the ownership percentage by some estimate of the value of the company.
Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?
#590Earlier quoted context omitted.
The median employee at FB is making $240k. We can safely assume the median engineer is making more than that. I never claimed that median engineer is making $400k. This entire thread is about the senior engineers and their payout after 4-5 of working at a company like FB vs at a startup. If you could do good work as an engineer at a startup for 4-5 years, pulling $400k at FB is very realistic for you. With the median…
> I'm not sure why you're trying to prove me wrong, but let's face facts: even that absolute median of $240k that includes non-engineers is better than what most engineers would pull at a startup. I think there has been a common disbelief among many commenters on this forum about engineers making that high compensation. There really isn't any upside to trying to convince others of this reality. Its easier to mock you…
You're probably right, it's just my first time encountering this.