try those questions:
- do employees work overtime because they have to or because they want to? - what do you do to keep your employees happy? - whats the turnover rate?
Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
201–210 of 348 posts
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#202Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's just a cop out! Such a tired meme!
It's true though. What's your counterargument? Tired memes can be tired because they're true.
If you want your startup to run for more than a year (= roughly the time the effects of technical debt start to kick in significantly in my experience), you need to find a good way how to handle technical debt, and keep it in check.
I have seen my share of startups where a platform plagued with technical debt was the main limitation for growth, which is a very avoidable situation.
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#203the answer to every question on this list: "We are a private company and don't share this information." Outside of the room, the Engineering team laughs at your questions, Operations and the CEO give each other quizzical looks before laughing too, and they go on to the next candidate. You get smug satisfaction for not going with "THAT Company who cant answer simple questions", until a reminder about the rent payment…
>Outside of the room, the Engineering team laughs at your questions, Operations and the CEO give each other quizzical looks before laughing too, and they go on to the next candidate.
This is such a short sighted perspective that it's laughable.
Good management will see that the candidate is thinking about joining the team as a long-term commitment and isn't just making a job change for a pay increase over their last/current role. It shows that candidate is showing up for the same reason the company exists -- to be fairly compensated for services rendered.
A leadership team that laughs at these questions are going to lose long-term, and should be avoided by potential employees and VC alike.
Edit: grammarz
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#204Earlier 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…
> Talent, not time, is the enemy of quality.
What a refreshingly interesting perspective!
How did you come upon this?
Anyone care to disagree?
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#205the answer to every question on this list: "We are a private company and don't share this information." Outside of the room, the Engineering team laughs at your questions, Operations and the CEO give each other quizzical looks before laughing too, and they go on to the next candidate. You get smug satisfaction for not going with "THAT Company who cant answer simple questions", until a reminder about the rent payment…
> "We are a private company and don't share this information."
I'm on the management side (was CEO CircleCI, now CTO darklang) and we would absolutely answer all these questions. It's a complete red flag for any company that would recruit an employee without telling them what they're actually getting.
It's reasonable to keep the answers to Qs 4, 5, 8, 10, 11, 14 and 15 until later in the hiring process when you're close to an offer, so long as you give directionally-correct answers first.
Personally, I would answer everything except 5 in a first interview (and that's only cause I'd have to look up the exact numbers).
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#206the answer to every question on this list: "We are a private company and don't share this information." Outside of the room, the Engineering team laughs at your questions, Operations and the CEO give each other quizzical looks before laughing too, and they go on to the next candidate. You get smug satisfaction for not going with "THAT Company who cant answer simple questions", until a reminder about the rent payment…
I would answer all of those questions. I have, in fact, answered versions of many of them in interviews.
I've noticed candidates who have had a bad experience at a previous startup often try to find a circumspect way to ask if we're profitable and if we're going to run out of money. Those are good and fair questions that I'm happy to answer.
I'm sure some companies would demure on some of these if the answers are uncomfortable. I hope not many would laugh!
For an engineering position I suggest candidates also ask if they can review some of the code they'd be working on like a recent pull request.
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#207Earlier quoted context omitted.
The company doesn't have to answer every question but it would be a huge red flag if the company could not answer any of them.
and your lack of higher salary history will be a huge red flag to your rental, credit, auto, mortgage, and accredited investor application
nit: there's no such thing as an accredited investor application.
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#208the answer to every question on this list: "We are a private company and don't share this information." Outside of the room, the Engineering team laughs at your questions, Operations and the CEO give each other quizzical looks before laughing too, and they go on to the next candidate. You get smug satisfaction for not going with "THAT Company who cant answer simple questions", until a reminder about the rent payment…
The context of the probing questions proposed is that of joining a startup.
If during the interview and negotiation process, a hiring manager (probably a large equity holder) at a startup company can't give me details regarding their equity, funding, board makeup, business strategy, work environment, competitors, challenges they're facing, and how I fit in to their strategy... why would I bother working with them? There are plenty of startup companies that will give me that information in order to sell me on joining them.
If they aren't serious enough to consider each hire vital enough to put some cards on the table, then I'm not about to waste my time working for them.
Further, there are plenty of non-startup companies I can go make a big paycheck at with 9-5 hours.
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#209The list of questions is great but I don't think there is a way to get to this kind of information for the majority of candidates.
1) A startup with marginal success and showing growing signs can simply ignore you and your questions and move to the next candidate. Startups where all these ducks are in a row has a strong candidate pipeline and they simply move on. You run the risk of standing out not as a diligent person, but as someone who is meddling in issues beyond his/her means.
2) A startup willing to divulge all this and walk the extra distance for you is probably too raw and desperately short of talent. When you get hold of all of this information, you might feel this startup is not worth it, given you now know where the skeletons are buried.
In the end, you really kind of have to wing it. Just like the VCs, the founders and everyone else is at an early stage of an endeavor. It is a high risk game, period.
My 2c is often towards ignoring all this math and doing your best to learn more about the founders, their motivation and if they will take care of you. Good founders always find a way to compensate you for your hard work whether by financial means or by paying it forward in other ways.
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#210>It is also important to note that early employees experience more dilution events. An example of a dilution event would be raising another round of funding. This is another reason why joining a company early should offer more equity. I disagree that it's important to note that early employees experience more dilution events. I know you're trying to educate but this type of advice unintentionally misinforms people an…
> I have no idea why dilution attracts so much verbiage that's out of proportion to its mathematical importance. Emotions. It's the same reason why many SMB owners get caught up in the 50/50 vs 49/51 split (when there are other, better ways of resolving the voting right aspect) or squabbling over a couple of percent in an investment deal. Logically, the differences are trivial, are likely to be diluted out anyways, a…
Because that split is the difference between control