Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?

#601

Post by throwaway7551 » Tue, Jun 12, 2018, 2:20 AM UTC

dmode wrote: post #387

ironjunkie wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The other thing that people seem to forget is that a lot of people calculate their FAANG Total Comp with the value of the stock today, not on the day they were given to them. This simply because you could have yourself bought those stocks at the same price back in the days. You cannot include the increase as part of your total comp This in some case makes a huge difference, especially now, where all the tech stocks h…

FAANGS give you RSUs, which are cash equivalent. When I am referring to 400K, I am referring to "total cash in hand" at the end of the year. Generally the comp you get quoted when you get hired is $200K base + $200K in RSUs based on hire date's stock price. So in today's frothy stock market, you would at least earn $400K and possibly more.

I'm at Google and I think only L7+ are getting that much, and that's not many people. I'm an L5 and my RSUs are less than 1/4 that.

Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?

#602

Post by whb07 » Tue, Jun 12, 2018, 2:22 AM UTC

shamino wrote: post #467

jjmorrison wrote: post #398

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This. It's really only obvious why founders deserve a much larger exit than employees after you've tried to start and run a company. There's plenty of edge cases where it doesn't feel fair, but in general, starting and running a successful startup is nothing like being an engineer. And it deserves a very different level of comp. Also - there's plenty of engineers at startups that wouldn't get a job at a large tech co…

My issue is that just because something was hard before you came, but you're just as talented, why do they get 10x in compensation ? It's kind of like saying because Steph Curry came to the Warriors 3 years before when they weren't a Championship-contending team, he deserves 10x Durant's salary. Curry was drafted by the Warriors and started the culture and created small-ball, but could you imagine his salary being so…

Your example isn’t that accurate. Imagine being a talented sailor coming into an already sea worthy vessel. That’s for sure worth something.

Now imagine having to create convince people to invest in your crazy boat idea, build the darn ship, prove it won’t sink, and then finally do some sailing.

In no alternate universe is sailing a ship the same as all the other steps. Maybe you’re just as talented as the main dude/owner of the ship. But you sure as heck don’t have the experience or skill in building a sea worthy ship.

Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?

#603

Post by MichaelBosworth » Tue, Jun 12, 2018, 2:25 AM UTC

Cons:

If you're an engineer in demand, and your startup exits nicely, your equity is still less than the market rate you would've gotten over the years. Less than your 3rd-best offer, for that matter.

Often you can't even know anything whatsoever about your upside and have to take it on faith. Faith! It is increasingly common that, as an employee, you are intentionally given too little information about the equity to know what you would be getting even if you had a crystal ball telling you the price for which the company was eventually going to be sold.

In 2018, because both the salary and the upside are low, working at a startup is in the same bucket as working pro bono, except that it's pro bono founders instead of pro bono publico. But you'll still get a pitch that the upside is big in the event of a nice exit (you just can't be trusted with specifics), and you'll hear a lot of rhetoric about how being scrappy is better than having 18 cafes and 23 massage rooms.

In 2018, unfortunately, it is, in short, a bit of a scam.

Pros:

Lack of bureaucracy.

Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?

#604

Post by borplk » Tue, Jun 12, 2018, 2:26 AM UTC

mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #538

eismcc wrote: post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Private offices are great, sort of. I haven’t had one in the last 15yrs in both big and small companies. I find it surprising that you have had access to this “benefit.”

Between 2008 and 2012 I worked in 3 different places where all developers and researchers had their own offices (interns were paired usually). It wasn’t even a second thought, it was just baked into the culture that obviously the work requires huge blocks of hours spent alone, privately engaged in contemplative work. One was a defense research lab, one was a boutique company that makes computational fluid dynamics so…

> Whatever my next job is, it has to give private offices, end of story.

Given how incredibly rare private offices seem to be these days I can't imagine what kind of leverage you must have to be able to stick to such a requirement.

Especially since unlike salary and other benefits it's not something that any company can decide to give you.

Either they have private office culture or not. If they are an open office company like most of them are you just have to exclude them, severely limiting the type and number of companies you can work for.

Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?

#605

Post by toephu2 » Tue, Jun 12, 2018, 2:27 AM UTC

dunpeal wrote: post #532

toephu2 wrote: post #522

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure why you are trying to dispute my facts when it's clear you have never worked at any of the above companies based on your comments. Even in Seattle it's well known that FB pays more than MSFT. So your theory about top tech needing to pay top dollar etc, doesn't hold.

You made the following claim: > There are only a handful of companies that pay $400k/yr for senior software engineers and MSFT ain't one of them This claim is false. There are a lot more than "a handful" of companies paying $400k for senior engineers. MSFT will also pay you this amount in the Bay. Overall, top tech pay about the same. You say FB pays better than MS in Seattle, and perhaps that is the case (as I state…

"Overall, top tech pay about the same."

No, they do not. Again, obviously you have never worked at a FANG company otherwise you would probably realize this. It's quite a well known fact in the Valley that FB/Google pay much better than MSFT/AMZN.

Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?

#606

Post by alex_young » Tue, Jun 12, 2018, 2:28 AM UTC

All this comp talk is a little silly imho. I literally just quit a job (today) at a big boring company where I brought home north of 300k / year to join a startup making less.

Why? Because doing something interesting is more important than making a ton of money. Because creating something is better than tending someone else's garden.

Seriously though, do what you want to. Go make some money. It may get old though, and then you'll be back. Impact has value

Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?

#607

Post by toephu2 » Tue, Jun 12, 2018, 2:29 AM UTC

dunpeal wrote: post #539

toephu2 wrote: post #523

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So? That's one engineer. I said top 20%. You act like the median engineer is pulling 400k at FB. They aren't.

The median employee at FB is making $240k. We can safely assume the median engineer is making more than that. I never claimed that median engineer is making $400k. This entire thread is about the senior engineers and their payout after 4-5 of working at a company like FB vs at a startup. If you could do good work as an engineer at a startup for 4-5 years, pulling $400k at FB is very realistic for you. With the median…

Yes I know the median is making $240k. The median eng is probably doing 250-360k. You do not work at a startup for 5 years straight out of college and then goto FB making 400k a year. A few do, but the median engineer does not.

Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?

#608

Post by joshuamorton » Tue, Jun 12, 2018, 2:32 AM UTC

tedsanders wrote: post #597

pm90 wrote: post #574

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm not sure why you're trying to prove me wrong, but let's face facts: even that absolute median of $240k that includes non-engineers is better than what most engineers would pull at a startup. I think there has been a common disbelief among many commenters on this forum about engineers making that high compensation. There really isn't any upside to trying to convince others of this reality. Its easier to mock you…

No one doubts that some developers are paid that much. What they doubt is that that compensation is normal. To me, the argument implicitly seems to be over the definition of what's "normal" rather than the actual existence or non-existence of highly paid developers. Of course highly paid developers exist.

That's really just a distinction without a difference. The point is that for reasonable definitions of normal, this is true. Some people don't believe that. Sure not every engineer takes home that much, but its also not only the top 5 or 10%, its significantly more than that.

Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?

#609

Post by tedsanders » Tue, Jun 12, 2018, 2:46 AM UTC

joshuamorton wrote: post #608

tedsanders wrote: post #597

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one doubts that some developers are paid that much. What they doubt is that that compensation is normal. To me, the argument implicitly seems to be over the definition of what's "normal" rather than the actual existence or non-existence of highly paid developers. Of course highly paid developers exist.

That's really just a distinction without a difference. The point is that for reasonable definitions of normal, this is true. Some people don't believe that. Sure not every engineer takes home that much, but its also not only the top 5 or 10%, its significantly more than that.

What evidence do you have that significantly more than 10% of engineers earn more than $400K?

Are you talking software engineers? Software engineers in the Bay Area? Software engineers in the Bay Area working for a subset of companies?

I suspect the reason this 'debate' exists is that we are not specific enough with our language to make our meanings clear to one another. :)

To me it's difficult to tell whether the commenters here are disagreeing over the objective reality of compensation distributions or the subjective reality of what counts as 'normal'.

Re: Ask HN: Pros and cons of working at a startup in 2018?

#610

Post by bsdpython » Tue, Jun 12, 2018, 2:47 AM UTC

jiveturkey wrote: post #80

Hard to contribute any more to this. Most of the pros and cons have been given, and are well known anyway. The problem space should probably be constrained to, pros and cons of joining a startup in 2018, in SV, now vs 3-5 years ago. Otherwise this isn't going anywhere interesting. My take on it is, founders should be encouraged to only take 3x equity of early employees, not 10x or 20x. This risk is the same, and the…

A long overdue recession will solve many of these problems