Is the goal here to make money? Engineer #25 will get at most .3% equity. At a billion dollar valuation that's 3 million, which sounds like a lot, but if you see that exit after 5 years, that's more like 600k a year. Senior eng at Fang makes 400k+, and is much more attainable than first 50 at big company. You'll have a much better chance climbing FAANG ladder if you want to make a bunch of money
Ask HN: How did you become one of the first 50 at a major tech company?
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Re: Ask HN: How did you become one of the first 50 at a major tech company?
#22Luck. Luck. And oh yeah also Luck.
I'm the first employee at a well funded, fast growing company. I was an entrepreneur myself so I saw a lot of startups. The most successful of the lot is one whose early days were so pathetic. Their initial idea was uninspiring. Their CEO was always tired and deflated. He took a bad investment and was pretty bummed by that.
No one can tell...
Re: Ask HN: How did you become one of the first 50 at a major tech company?
#23How I got in: referral from friend who found the startup through another friend. Why I joined: Was tired of big tech and wanted to learn faster. Founders were smart. Ran a surprisingly tight interview process. Advice: if I were to reverse-engineer this, I would follow Seed-Series A investments from Tier 1 firms. These are the highest-signal companies.
Tier 1 firms (YC, 500 startups?) are great, but honestly they do invest in a lot of crap too. Glassdoor has some surprisingly tiny companies and they're useful for flagging issues. I do bring up these issues in the interviews and let the interview address them fairly.
Re: Ask HN: How did you become one of the first 50 at a major tech company?
#24Earlier quoted context omitted.
You have revealed cynicism without evidence. There is no shame in working at a BigCorp, they ship lots of useful real life products and features. My response expressed the lessons I (and many other HNers) have learned THE HARD WAY ALREADY! What is wrong with trying to save a young puppy from suffering the harsh consequences of reality that I've had to endure? It's free advice, if you don't find it helpful please feel…
> What is wrong with trying to save a young puppy from suffering the > harsh consequences of reality that I've had to endure? Because it's incredibly rude. You're treating them like a child. If someone goes to baking.com and asks for advice on becoming a pastry chef, don't warn them away because being a pastry chef pays poorly.
Disagree - I would want to know the reality of being a pastry chef if I went to baking.com.
Re: Ask HN: How did you become one of the first 50 at a major tech company?
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
> What is wrong with trying to save a young puppy from suffering the > harsh consequences of reality that I've had to endure? Because it's incredibly rude. You're treating them like a child. If someone goes to baking.com and asks for advice on becoming a pastry chef, don't warn them away because being a pastry chef pays poorly.
> If someone goes to baking.com and asks for advice on becoming a pastry chef, don't warn them away because being a pastry chef pays poorly. I would want to be warned. It's highly likely I wasn't aware of that information.
Giving any advice depends on context.
I've listened to someone say they want to become a chef, and knowing it involves 12+ hour shifts, I've said "That sounds like a solid choice!" because this was an actual thing that pays money and a thing they could actually do.
Re: Ask HN: How did you become one of the first 50 at a major tech company?
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, >1% is a lot of equity for a non-founding employee.
Not really, if they aren't going to value you at >1% when they're small, they're probably delusional and you already know everything you need to make a good decision in your own best interest. Founders being greedy when the company is worthless is always a bad sign in my considerable experience (more than 20 years in the game, and grew up in PA, CA worshipping the startup culture of the 90s). For the quintessential c…
2% max seems pretty normal to me. Ex: https://searchgently.notion.site/Founding-SWE-at-Gently-com-....
How much equity would you expect if you were the first engineering hire?
Re: Ask HN: How did you become one of the first 50 at a major tech company?
#27I had worked at Yahoo with people who had been there forever; did good work and made a good impression. Working on a lot of stuff that needed to be done, but not enough work to have a person or usually do knowledge transfer until it breaks (or needs to move), so lots of interfacing with old timers.
Anyway, I got recruited by four people I worked with there, who had formed startups. I managed to choose the one that had the best exit, but just by luck. One person I didn't want to work with again, one was at a time I was still happy at Yahoo and the product wasn't super interesting to me, the other two called me within weeks of each other (they were both moving to larger offices from an office they shared that was closing) and I picked the one with a realistic commute and the product I liked better.
So, I guess make an impression that you can get stuff done with smart, entreprenuerial people.
Re: Ask HN: How did you become one of the first 50 at a major tech company?
#28First one: rare-to-unique domain knowledge useful to that team. (So, yeah, luck.)
Second: founder (went nowhere, as so many do).
Third: ditto.
Current: Founder is a long time colleague and friend from the first one, plus rare domain knowledge, plus demonstrated enthusiasm for the work while contracting with the team.
So a mix of luck and hard work.
Re: Ask HN: How did you become one of the first 50 at a major tech company?
#29Outside of Silicon Valley (I'm only interested in UK/Europe) I've seen several opportunities. I did work for a startup for around 3months which was a terrible fit for me ~15 people and not offering equity at that time but low paying market rate salary. I was never going to have the passion for the business the founders have and that seemed to be unacceptable to them and they were constantly firing people.
I also had the opportunity to come in as a dba at a db as a service startup locally. There were only 2-3 people there and that may have been a good fit for me but I didn't want to make the jump at that point. They probably would have offered equity.
Around that time I would attend various db/web/mobile meetup events locally and I imagine that would be a good way to get in.
Re: Ask HN: How did you become one of the first 50 at a major tech company?
#30I had a friend that worked there and he tweeted about an open position and I applied and got the job.
I talked with two co-founders (CEO and the CTO at the time) on my interview process and when they explained their plans, I saw a common problem that everyone I knew had (banking in Brazil), so my first thought was: this can be a huge opportunity.