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Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup

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Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup

#161

Post by dang »

decebalus1 wrote: post #105
zakm wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So do you have some kinda data breakdown on the typical startup, or just other anecdotal experience?

Do I need to provide data breakdown to prove that an anecdote is just an anecdote? I'm trying to figure out if you're trying a full fledged 'On the spot fallacy' or just a basic 'shifting the burden of proof'.

The flamey unsubstantive sort of comments you've posted in this thread are just what we're trying to avoid here. If you'd please review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and follow the rules of the site, we'd appreciate it.

HN threads are conversation. Anecdotes are the life blood of conversation. This is an internet forum, not a peer-reviewed journal.

Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup

#162

Post by reaperducer »

latch wrote: post #72
Waterluvian wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the context of a startup, I would expect almost all of those to be disappointing. But maybe that's what you're hoping to see. In my opinion, if you're a start-up and you've got all those boxes checked, you're possibly doing the right things in the wrong order, and that's a red flag for me. What I hope to hear are responses like, "so this is how we're doing CI. It's awful, almost non-existent. But that's because at…

I would expect most to be disappointing too, and it's a good idea to avoid those. Proper logging doesn't take more time, it just takes more discipline / giving a damn. People and companies that say: we don't have time to do it right Almost always mean: we don't know how to do it right Talent, not time, is the enemy of quality. (at some point that stops being true, but most companies (startups or not) are soooo far fr…

Proper logging doesn't take more time, it just takes more discipline / giving a damn. People and companies that say: we don't have time to do it right Almost always mean: we don't know how to do it right

You're not wrong. But we're talking startups here, not established companies. It's publish or perish time.

When the company has enough breathing room, circle back around and do it the way the big boys do.

Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup

#163

Post by adtac »

alain94040 wrote: post #26
jpmoyn wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you elaborate on why your payoff is $0 if you have 1% vested common stock in the company?

The answer is hidden in your question: you own common stock. The investors got preferred stock. As the name implies, their stock has privileges. A common one is liquidation preference. They get their money back first, then the common shareholders get whatever is left. For an extreme example, say the VC invested $10M for 10% of the company, and then the company doesn't manage to grow, and gets acquired for the same $1…

Let's say the company gets acquired for $20M. Is it still possible for the other 90% to make $0? Or is the preference amount exactly equal to the invested amount?

Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup

#164

Post by nostrademons »

derefr wrote: post #152
nostrademons wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Bootstrapping" usually refers to funding the company (in the seed stage) without external investment, whether through pre-selling to customers, relying on founders' savings, doing consulting, etc. I think the term you're looking for is "profitable".

Not quite, since a "profitable" investor-backed company is still usually pushed by those investors to seek further investment, whether the company needs it to continue growing or not. (It just needs it to grow to the level that an investor would care about .) The concept here is closer to "firing your investors" or "buying back your equity", but they haven't necessarily done that yet.

If you've got board control after the Series A and are profitable, they have zero leverage over your future decisions.

Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup

#165

Post by pmart123 »

maddening wrote: post #28

I believe that equity is mostly SF thing. One of my friends works in a startup in Berlin where he was offered equity as one of the founders (10th engender or sth like that). Chances that he will be able to liquidate them in foreseeable future is non existing. Nobody else that I know was offered an equity, even though quite a lot of my friends work for well funded startups. I worked in some and nobody offered me anyth…

I’d argue that even in NYC, people associate less value with equity compensation. But, when most of the multi-billion exits have happened in SV, isn’t this entirely justifiable?

Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup

#166

Post by gist »

I am not seeing that this document addresses the important concept of timing. That is when to ask the questions. I am not certain that (as in any negotiation) it pays to ask everything initially. It would be like going out on a date with someone and hitting them with a list of questions prior to even having the dessert. Timing is critical. For one thing depending on how well they like a candidate they might be more likely to agree to something that they initially say they can't do. Especially once they have invested enough time.

There is no clear answer for the correct time other than to not assume it's simply ok to state everything upfront (vs. time wasted on the part of the applicant).

Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup

#167

Post by sarthakjain »

latch wrote: post #4

I've been thinking about low-friction options for getting a sense of the engineering quality. I don't think I'm alone in thinking that technical debt and bad software development practices are a top concern. Being quite senior now, I'd feel comfortable asking: 1 - To see their CI dashboard 2 - To see a sample of their production systems stdout & stderr 3 - Asking to review a recent non-trivial commit (with the person…

Most early stage companies would have had terrible answers to these questions. Including Facebook/Google/Uber/Amazon. Which just indicates that it might not have been an ideal role for you which is fair. Being the first 2-3 engineers at a startup is not everyone's cup of tea. The risk in most cases makes no sense for a sane individual. Your questions indicate a sense of "safety" that an engineer might want from their next gig.

They might not even be able to hire a Senior Engineer in most cases. Maybe you wouldn't even want to talk to an early stage startup at your current seniority level.

Having said that for anybody who really wants to join an early stage startup the only thing that should probably matter is what is it that you're trying to do and how can I help you reach your goal? Will you be able to pay me enough on time and for how long?

Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup

#168

Post by chipotle_coyote »

jimmy1 wrote: post #67
aw1621107 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought standard work weeks were 40 hours (at least in the US)? Are your work weeks normally shorter?

40 hours is the target. In practice, most salaried employees work around 50-60 hours a week -- more if you count checking and responding to email after work / pager duty / etc

While I'm aware some would call this a rather contrarian opinion, I truly believe that if you're in a salaried position and routinely required to work 45 or more hours a week, whether by actual mandate or "but that's just what we all do here" cultural pressure, there is something wrong with that company, more than likely starting at the top. Many companies have extraordinary crunch periods for one reason or another, and that's fine, but if you're in a crunch period more often than you aren't, that's no longer extraordinary.

Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup

#169

Post by burtonator »

latch wrote: post #4

I've been thinking about low-friction options for getting a sense of the engineering quality. I don't think I'm alone in thinking that technical debt and bad software development practices are a top concern. Being quite senior now, I'd feel comfortable asking: 1 - To see their CI dashboard 2 - To see a sample of their production systems stdout & stderr 3 - Asking to review a recent non-trivial commit (with the person…

Some of these are actually good points because as a software engineer I pride myself in thinks like code documentation, comments, logging, etc.

Another idea would be to see their event and analytics dashboard for their infrastructure KPIs.

If they don't have one it's a bit of a red flag.

Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup

#170

Post by spookthesunset »

nlh wrote: post #64
jasode wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>It's important to be aware of dilution events so that you realize when you accept the offer that your .025% will be more like .008% But you're repeating the same error of prioritizing the wrong thing: dilution. What employees ultimately care about is their wealth calculation: shares_multiplied_by_price . Example of the type of math people actually care about: 0.008% (because dilutions) a $1 billion company is $80k 0…

You’re entirely (technically) correct. The issue is that side-effect often comes into play because employees like to calculate potential future outcomes, and that’s done based only on overall company value (since that’s one of the only data points that’s available from past acquisitions). I’m sure you get this and I know the psychology of what an employee might hope for shouldn’t be relevant, but unfortunately it is.…

What you are saying, I think, is it is important to figure out what the expected future value of each of your shares are. All you have to go on, in general, is "what do companies like this one generally sell for"? From that, assuming all the preferred stock get converted back to common stock, you can figure out what each unit of stock is worth. The problem is, the cap table you have now won't be the cap table you have when the company gets bought out.

It's not dilution that is the problem. Dilution is just what happens when you bring in new money. It's that it is very hard to predict what a reasonable upper bound is for the future value of your shares.

Quite frankly, it is one of the big reasons I think trading salary for stock options is a horrible idea. Much better to treat those options are lotto tickets--the odds they pay out in any meaningful life changing way are very small.

Startups don't like to hear this because the truth is, when you work for a startup you almost always take a sizable hit to your salary.

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