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Downsides to working at a tech giant

blog.garrytan.com

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Re: Downsides to working at a tech giant

#101

Post by geofft »

dang wrote: post #57
ogre_codes wrote: post #17

My big mistake? Not being buddies with Peter Thiel in 2003. Don't make my mistake, go back in time and be buddies with Peter Thiel in 2003. Just the fact that he had a buddy who could cut him a check for $70,000 before his startup succeeded says a whole lot about the situation he was in. If you have a buddy who tosses around this kind of cash, your options are different from the options available to the overwhelming…

This is a shallow dismissal, which the HN guidelines ask you not to do, and especially not out of indignation. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html It's obvious from early in the article that Garry wasn't "buddies" with Thiel. He had just graduated, and a college friend was the connection. That means your point reduces to: people who go to elite colleges encounter opportunities as a result. No one disagre…

I disagree with this. Why was Thiel willing to cut him a check - would he have done so for any software engineer straight out of college? Did he technically interview Tan?

If the original comment is revised from "Be buddies with Peter Thiel" to "Be in the set of should take the Microsoft job and hold out for promo - and I think you're shallowly dismissing this comment.

Re: Downsides to working at a tech giant

#102

Post by senordevnyc »

stoicShell wrote: post #27
lordleft wrote: post #2

The simple truth is that working for the equity of an unproven start-up is a gamble, and statistically unlikely to pay off. And sadly more and more start-ups are undermining access to equity in shady ways. Not that one should never work for a start up on the hopes it breaks big, but we should also never forget that the successes are outliers, by a massive margin. Just understand the trade-offs of your decision and th…

> statistically unlikely to pay off > probabilities involved with your decision While this is a good general approach to life IMHO as well — if you mean "be rational, not just emotional" and "work on your cognitive biases, seek objectivity" — it might also prove terribly counterproductive in this context. It would take a book or five but briefly: - you just can't use statistics when they say "95% fail", otherwise you…

You just can't use statistics when they say "95% fail", otherwise you just don't do startups, ever. With that mindset, joining an established company is more likely to "succeed" for you and maximize serenity.

Actually, you certainly can do that. Most people do. And depending on what you're optimizing for, it seems pretty rational to me.

Another stat for you: most entrepreneurs fail "about twice" before making it, i.e. you'll probably fail 1-3 times for sure before entering the 5% of those who create a profitable business. Trick #1, thus: you can roll the dice several times (consider 2-5 years per "real try").

Yes, but that's for founders, not employees. If "success" here is defined as "made more in risk-adjusted income as early-stage startup employee than I would have made as big tech company employee", I doubt any early stage employees are "successful". Every failed startup you participate in (2-5 years of your life gone) adds to the opportunity cost "debt" you have to make up once one succeeds.

Re: Downsides to working at a tech giant

#103

Post by garry »

ericjang wrote: post #53

A lot of the comments are rightly pointing out the logical fallacy of survivorship bias in the article, but I don't think Garry intended to say that "choosing to work for Palantir in 2003 was the expected-wealth maximizing career decision and that's why you should join a startup". I think the title and lede, "working for Microsoft cost me $200M" is intended to be provocative and encourage clicks on the article, while…

Apologies for the clickbait— I'm trying to build a YouTube following and having some collaborations drop this week. Just trying to make it work on that platform. The values and what is acceptable on different social networks is so different! I didn't really think it would appear on here, so tuning it for different audiences is hard.

Re: Downsides to working at a tech giant

#104

Post by garry »

friendlybus wrote: post #83

Why did he value Microsoft over Their? There is something in his character that held in higher regard one decision over the other, there's no exploration of what caused the conflict in the first instance and a likelihood it will happen again. What should he have done with himself at that point and all future similar points where he has opportunity again? This post seems to be more about signalling than lessons learne…

I'll try to make a longer post about this. It's hard to get it right in 5 minutes of video.

Re: Downsides to working at a tech giant

#105

Post by geofft »

OmarIsmail wrote: post #52
pathseeker wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>In fact, I'll just give you 1000 shares of Apple stock, there's no risk to you". And you said no. That's not the same. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opportunity_cost

In the video Garry mentioned that Thiel offered him a check for his salary. Not quite no risk, but effectively so. He'd be able to go back to MS after 6 months/1 year no problem and would have only lost out on some vesting. He probably would be able to go back to a better position which often happens.

> He'd be able to go back to MS after 6 months/1 year no problem and would have only lost out on some vesting.

And internal tenure and connections. Yes, for some companies, it's easier to get promoted as a new applicant. At others it's easier to get internally promoted and losing out on a year of that costs you quite a bit of future value.

Re: Downsides to working at a tech giant

#106

Post by garry »

cmdshiftf4 wrote: post #15

How many countless others have invested years of their lives, in exchange for equity and comparatively low pay, in promising-sounding startups only to see those companies fail? Should they be retroactively counting the money they could have had if they'd went to a more stable firm and had the same years of pay increases, bonuses, RSUs, etc. as a loss? This is hollow clickbait, but the author is clearly intelligent en…

This gives me a good idea for a video: How and when to quit.

To be frank I also quit Palantir far earlier than maybe I should have. A story for another day.

Thank you for the feedback though, I do appreciate it.

Re: Downsides to working at a tech giant

#107

Post by dang »

geofft wrote: post #101
dang wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a shallow dismissal, which the HN guidelines ask you not to do, and especially not out of indignation. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html It's obvious from early in the article that Garry wasn't "buddies" with Thiel. He had just graduated, and a college friend was the connection. That means your point reduces to: people who go to elite colleges encounter opportunities as a result. No one disagre…

I disagree with this. Why was Thiel willing to cut him a check - would he have done so for any software engineer straight out of college? Did he technically interview Tan? If the original comment is revised from "Be buddies with Peter Thiel" to "Be in the set of should take the Microsoft job and hold out for promo - and I think you're shallowly dismissing this comment.

Having finished the article, I was just coming back here to edit my comment, because I described it inaccurately. The article isn't only about taking the opportunities that come your way; it's more specific. It's about owning more of the value that you create and having more creative autonomy in your work.

Some people are going to respond positively to that message, others not, for various reasons, but it obviously has nothing in principle to do with Peter Thiel or "Be in the set of <1000 people who has connections with Peter Thiel sufficient to get him to write you a check".

Re: Downsides to working at a tech giant

#109

Post by shadowgovt »

ericjang wrote: post #53

A lot of the comments are rightly pointing out the logical fallacy of survivorship bias in the article, but I don't think Garry intended to say that "choosing to work for Palantir in 2003 was the expected-wealth maximizing career decision and that's why you should join a startup". I think the title and lede, "working for Microsoft cost me $200M" is intended to be provocative and encourage clicks on the article, while…

Everyone's opinions on tradeoffs vary. Were it me, I wouldn't be proud if I'd made the call to join the company that is directly supporting The US's broken ICE system (https://www.google.com/amp/s/slate.com/technology/2019/05/do...), even if I were $200M richer. It seems Garry dodged a bullet on this one.

Re: Downsides to working at a tech giant

#110

Post by garry »

zainamro wrote: post #44

VCs feel the need to constantly remind us that working at a startup is worth our time as a means to fuel the startup workforce. I understand that he was simply sharing an anecdote, but I found the conclusions and headline misleading even verging on dishonest. I've worked at an early stage bay area startup -- hiring progressively got harder and harder because candidates were becoming more aware of the career risks inv…

Yeah, at the end of the post I tried to reference this: You probably shouldn't work at a startup for the money per se. The real value is short cycles with users and being able to make decisions and ship.

This is also cautionary for startups. You have to be an actually rewarding place to work, otherwise there is literally no reason to work there.

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