Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
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Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
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Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#2(I think it's hilarious I'm being downvoted for making a factual observation...)
It amazes me how different startup culture, and tech culture in general, is from the rest of the country.
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Every job I've ever worked at:
Relocation expenses? hahahaha
Equity? haha we'll wave your brokerage fee to buy as our stock purchase program but if you wanna sell, you'll be paying brokerage fees.
Responsibilities? You'll do what we tell you, when we tell you, and you'll live with it. If you don't like it, you're fired. You are disposable, we do not need you, we can replace you in a matter of days with someone that'll happily shut up, sit down, and do as they're told.
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Then of course things like bonuses. I've never had a bonus at any job I've worked at in 17 years of W2 employment. Not once. In fact, I've never even had an annual cost of living increase just a 'merit based increase' at some jobs which is almost always less than inflation.
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#3I like this as a great starter list. When I joined my first startup 8 years ago, I didn’t know to ask basically any of these questions. I just assumed I’d work hard and get a Lamborghini some day (only half joking).
On the fundraising side, I’d add, “What is your fundraising steategy” when talking to the founders. This massively changes potential value calculations in terms of equity. I know some founders who are focused on not raising funds and pure profitability, others who are focused on growth by any means. Part of the calculus here is that by not shooting for more fundraising rounds, the founders may be signaling that they won’t be selling anytime soon. In that case, you should look to understand what your exercise rights are for your options. Do you have to exercise within 90 days, or is there a grace period?
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#4I'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/people who wrote it)
4 - If you're interviewing remotely for an on-site position, finding out if they have an open office
5 - Finding out how they do deploys / devops
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#5(I think it's hilarious I'm being downvoted for making a factual observation...) It amazes me how different startup culture, and tech culture in general, is from the rest of the country. ---- Every job I've ever worked at: Relocation expenses? hahahaha Equity? haha we'll wave your brokerage fee to buy as our stock purchase program but if you wanna sell, you'll be paying brokerage fees. Responsibilities? You'll do wha…
I guess you worked at more mature companies / corporate settings.
Or EU.
I'm from EU, and worked for NA companies, and got most of that covered.
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#6Ask to see the pitch deck. A good startup will have a pitch deck that clearly explains the plan, market, team, and more.
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#7I'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…
In scenario of:
- If you get the money and opportunity to hire really senior/well known dev to lead your eng. team, would yo do it
- Ummm no, we believe in our team, and their strong knowledge, there is no problem they cannot solve (or something along those lines)
Run.
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#8>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 and causes people to pay attention to the wrong thing. Ultimately, the more important math is number_of_shares multiplied by share_price. As long as that goes up, dilution is not as important. What employees will care about is whether the total money wealth went up and not whether their 5% ownership turned into 4% because a new investment round bought 20% of the company. I have no idea why dilution attracts so much verbiage that's out of proportion to its mathematical importance.
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#9I'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…
I disagree - tech debt and bad practices can be fixed with good leadership. But poor leadership will never give you the opportunities to make such corrections. I do agree that knowing the status quo is useful, but the trajectory the organization is on is more important than today's exact position.
I ask questions more along the lines of what is wrong, and how are they correcting it. Good answers there can show a good long-term result. Bad answers there... run away.
Re: Questions to Ask Before Joining a Startup
#10(I think it's hilarious I'm being downvoted for making a factual observation...) It amazes me how different startup culture, and tech culture in general, is from the rest of the country. ---- Every job I've ever worked at: Relocation expenses? hahahaha Equity? haha we'll wave your brokerage fee to buy as our stock purchase program but if you wanna sell, you'll be paying brokerage fees. Responsibilities? You'll do wha…
I think the dividing line here has nothing to do with tech or startups, and merely jobs where the employee supply is short of the employer demand. Or, higher quality workers generating multiples more revenue.
It’s true that if you’re not in a role where you have the ability to massively swing revenue for a business, you’re not going to receive the same offers. However, there are tons of opportunities out there beyond tech, people just need to want to go after them.
All that being said, situations are way different for traditional blue collar jobs and I get that. I wish my mom, who does not have a college degree, had the same negotiating power that I do, but she doesn’t. So, I help her out as best I can (she’ll probably live off and on with me for the rest of her life- 20 to 30 years).
Life across the globe comes with spectrums of challenges. While not comparable to lack of potable water, knowing the right questions to ask in a startup interview is still a challenge none the less.