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Comment by kogir | Hacker News Reader

This may be an unpopular opinion here, but I'd strongly advise you against working at a startup as an employee.

Some key things to consider:

    * What comp are you giving up?
    * Will your options be worth more than Facebook/Google/Amazon/Apple RSUs?
    * Can you even afford your options?
    * Will the options ever be liquid?
    * Are you willing to earn-out after an acquisition?
    * Will you have to do extra work? Are you compensated for it?

Starting a startup is great and you totally should. But working at one is (on average) setting yourself up to be worse off financially than working elsewhere. Make that decision deliberately and consciously only after really running the numbers and thinking critically about it.

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Financially, you're probably correct. Most people, however, work at a startup for different reasons:

  * Less bureaucracy, more building
  * Larger impact on a product; not just being a cog
  * Generalist rather than one narrowly defined job
  * Ability to learn many new skills
  * Experience for starting their own startup
  * Working on something they believe in
  * Working with newer technologies
  * Can't get a job at a larger company (due to skillsets)
  * Easier place to make a jump into product management or people management
  * Flexibility (work from home, set own hours, etc)

Many large corporations are structuring themselves around this kind of model. I recently started working for one of Canada's largest financial institutions and they've managed to check most of these boxes for me. I do front-end development though, so it might be different for more technical roles.

I work at one of the companies in the parent post (~1/2 year), and worked mainly at startups prior.

I have less meetings than I had at most startups by a significant fraction. I have total technical direction on the product I work on (within reason). I have gotten to code in more languages than at any other shop I’ve been at, most of which I had zero professional experience in prior. I work on an internal product that excites me & is more complex than anything else I have worked with prior professionally. I work with any technology I like that does the job, new or old. Have no competition to jump into management because not enough engineers want to become managers. I also have flexibility to take days off unofficially because I work hard of my own volition, as well as work from home, and almost all of the flexibility I have gotten from startups.

Not to say I don’t like some things about startups - after all, I worked at them for about 75% of my career spanning over 5 years. There are a lot of myths about bigger companies out there though I have found at my current job, and friends at similar companies like Facebook and Netflix.

Yes, that's what people think they can get out of startups. But having worked in both startups and large companies, I can say a few of those things aren't true.

Less bureaucracy, more building - Only if the founders give you autonomy. Lots of micromanagers in the startup world.

Working on something they believe in - When you're hired, they try to hook you with this line. But startups are not charities. The longer you work at one, the more cynical you get.

Flexibility (work from home, set own hours, etc) - In my experience, startups want you to work more than 40 hours a week, and expect you to check your email during your free time, in case something urgent comes up. You can call that flexibility, but it's not in the employee's favor.

I've found the rest of your points to be true, more or less.

One doesn’t need to work at a startup for most of this points. My company is over 16 years old and we also meet the following bullets:

  * Less bureaucracy, more building
  * Larger impact on a product; not just being a cog
  * Generalist rather than one narrowly defined job
  * Ability to learn many new skills
  * Working on something they believe in
  * Working with newer technologies
  * Flexibility (work from home, set own hours, etc)

Most of our engineering team has stayed for more than 5 years. Some have been there for 15 years.

Although I agree with your list of considerations, I'm against your advice in general terms, since I think you're only providing part of the picture people need to consider.

Here's some situations where you might prefer a startup.

1. Do you want to change career paths? A startup provides a much lower barrier of entry than traditional companies.

2. Do you want to pursue a career without having the credentials i.e. skip school completely and become a programmer, salesman, businessman? An internship or job at a startup might be a good choice.

3. Do you want less bureaucracy, a lot of ownership, challenging problems, but not have to have the weight of everything on your shoulders (like when you're a cofounder).

Monetarily, its almost always going to be a bad choice to work at a startup (unless #1 or #2 are your reasons and you want to jump into a career where you can long-term earn more). But there are a lot of other things in life to consider besides money, and money isn't a motivator for everyone, some people weight more control over their day to day work, flat hierarchies, and working on innovative products, etc. - all over money that's all. I don't think, knowing that, there's enough to make any hard recommendations for anyone.

Working at a startup is never optimal economically, especially at an early stage one. There are non economical reasons why it might make sense for someone, but EV is not one of them.

> Working at a startup is never optimal economically, especially at an early stage one.

Working at a startup can be a form of investing in yourself. Obviously you shouldn't invest in yourself unless you think that investment will pay off in the longterm. At the same time though, if you don't invest in yourself then it's almost certain that no one else will either.

I think something to consider is that working at a startup is an extremely common path to starting one yourself.

True! That's a great reason to do it.

Does that mean "many people who work at a startup later start one" or "of people who start startups, many have worked at one"?

Or "You learn more about doing a startup by working at one"

Perhaps true, but there's more to life than money. The basic formula for work enjoyment is autonomy, mastery and purpose (the intrinsic motivators) and those are often much more attainable at a startup. Money and fame are extrinsic motivators that many find ring hollow after a while and they notice they don't enjoy waking up and going into the office each morning.

Everyone's situation is different so try not to assert that any choice is incorrect based on a single, somewhat vacuous metric.

It is a totally valid point, but you are jumping to conclusions if you presume that those questions will always lead to negative answers. Sometimes they will... but sometimes startups do pay market rates, and sometimes you just want to take a chance on something new.

> Starting a startup is great and you totally should.

Wouldn't you ask the same set of questions that you describe for this position as well? Why is the outcome different? Arguably, you're taking so much risk as a founder that your expected financial outcome will almost certainly be worse than working at Facebook/Google/Amazon in the early days.

You're right. The magnitude of the potential upside and the control you can influence over outcomes is vastly different as a founder vs an employee though.

Not everyone can get hired by a name brand company. No need to rub it in

I work at a name brand company (a really well known brand, honestly, over 200,000 employees), and I dream of switching to an exciting startup.

> Starting a startup is great and you totally should. But working at one is (on average) setting yourself up to be worse off financially than working elsewhere.

One of the best ways to get into YC is by working for a YC startup, especially if you don't come from a top tier school or company.

If you are above a mid-level engineer the. I can agree with your point. It rarely financially turn out to be a good move.

However if you want to break into software engineering then startups can be a great place for a hungry developer to make their own waves, and potentially ride them to success.

You need to ask how are options etc taxed and are there any preference shares or liquidation preferences

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