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Silicon Valley's best kept secret: Founder liquidity

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Re: Silicon Valley's best kept secret: Founder liquidity

#241

Post by shoo »

throrway12 wrote: post #129

I worked at a preseed company recently. Here's my experience: - Work 9 to 7 everyday. 6 days a week. - People are working 9 am - 5 am in crunch time. Then joining again at 10 am. - Monetary Comp is exactly market average. - Equity Comp is even more paltry since founders raised at a huge valuation. - Founders make unrealistic promises. Eg: It took a competitor with 7 people, 3 months to make a product. The founder tol…

it's important to figure out where to set your own boundaries. people out to exploit you will seek to see how far they can push. congratulations for leaving.

one thing that catches out some junior folks is that they may believe this kind of behaviour from bosses is normal and unavoidable as they have only worked for exploitative bosses at places with toxic cultures. you can do better, you're worth it. get out. find a more mature company with professional managers, where it's normal to leave the office on time and turn off all your work comms and leave all work-related messages unanswered until you're back in the office and getting paid to think about work again.

Re: Silicon Valley's best kept secret: Founder liquidity

#242

Post by dumbfounder »

I don’t agree with this sentiment: Investors, founders, and employees all believe that founders are taking more risk than early employees (this isn’t true once founders have exclusive access to liquidity)

This completely discounts how much risk and stress go into the early stages before money is raised, or before enough money is raised to pay founders properly. They often go into debt, put many aspects of their lives on hold, and undergo outsized stress that is largely alleviated by the liquidity event, enabling them to plow forward and shoot for the moon. There are outliers that are insane, but you can’t throw the baby out with the bath water.

Re: Silicon Valley's best kept secret: Founder liquidity

#243

Post by [deleted] »

rmbyrro wrote: post #230
mapt wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you have 200 million "of your own money" to spare, you are no longer just a person for the purposes of this conversation, you're a walking VC fund, and you're not really risking a substantial change to your quality of life going from 250M to 50M net worth. Your living expenses are already generously compensated for by the large salary that you, the VC fund pays you, the person, out of your personal bank account, a…

You may dislike Elon, but it's pretty absurd to say that what he did is trivial.

[deleted]

Re: Silicon Valley's best kept secret: Founder liquidity

#244

Post by PeterisP »

jahewson wrote: post #114
selestify wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why the disparity? Especially with Canada - no language barrier and no time zone differences. Why doesn’t the free market equalize Canadian dev wages with American ones?

How much do Canadian tech companies earn per employee? There’s your answer.

So many of the companies are global, or at least have offices both in USA and Canada. Why do they hire devs in USA instead of Canada?

Re: Silicon Valley's best kept secret: Founder liquidity

#246

Post by cherryteastain »

xandrius wrote: post #184
zaptheimpaler wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depends on the options available to the candidate. Typically someone joining a startup very early probably has the skill to get FAANG salaries with less stress and more free time. There are also hundreds or thousands of mid size companies that pay very well nowadays, its not just FAANG.

Yeah but smaller startups might be more open to non-US applicants, FAANG and other more established companies don't seem to be interested in hiring abroad. That's what makes the early startup scene the only thing available for some.

How come? Most large companies have big legal/HR departments that are very efficient at the whole visa application process. A small company won't have that expertise/staff. I mostly see startups being more concerned about the visa status of applicants.

Re: Silicon Valley's best kept secret: Founder liquidity

#247

Post by doodda »

This post has managed to piss off everyone: employees who didn't realize founders were getting liquidity events while they're still sitting on their more-often-than-not valueless equity, and founders who feel they've earned it and don't like the implication they haven't.

Re: Silicon Valley's best kept secret: Founder liquidity

#248

Post by zztop44 »

sneak wrote: post #191
angio wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of people (esp people that performed extremely well in school and in corporate environment) find "failing" and "losing reputation" very stressful.

Landlords and supermarkets dgaf. There is no real risk, and if they stress over it, that’s more a founder’s own psychological failing than anything else. If you care what other people think that much, you probably don’t have sufficient quantities of the oft-cited “grit” that founders supposedly require.

I think if the idea of your company failing doesn’t cause you at least some stress then you probably shouldn’t be running a company?

Re: Silicon Valley's best kept secret: Founder liquidity

#249

Post by xyzzy4747 »

throwaway-blaze wrote: post #61

I must be an idiot, I've been a cofounder or first hire in 6 startups (2 successful) over the last 25 years and have literally never been offered secondary during a Seed or Series A or B.

You don’t necessarily get offered it, you demand it as a term. If it’s a “hot startup” you pick and choose your investors so if some don’t like it they can walk.

Re: Silicon Valley's best kept secret: Founder liquidity

#250

Post by newswasboring »

chatmasta wrote: post #181
kneath wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have seen a lot of companies, a lot of rounds. I have known zero founders who have turned down an option to take money off the table (and zero A raises that offered that to employees). I love the idea of your universe, though.

This assumes that the founders are aware of, or offered, the option. If anything this is an argument for why founders should be represented by a banker or lawyer at the closing of every investment round. Let the founders do the negotiating, but once it comes time to sign the papers, bring in the sharks.

That's not common? I was under the impression that everyone hires at least a lawyer to get through the paper work.
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