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The first employees do not take nearly as much as risk as founders. Yeah you might lose your job if the company fails, but at least you were hired and got a salary from day one, you didn't have to work for a year or more on no salary and not knowing whether you would be able to raise money to even hire that first employee.

The one thing You Truly Cannot Afford at work is low social status.

If you're a founder, raise a seed round, but fail, you can still say, "People gave me $1 million to follow my dreams, bitch", and explain your failure as the sudden entrance of a massive competitor (e.g. Google) into your space. People will understand and not see it is your fault. The social status that comes with having raised money (other people thought you were impressive) moves you along to a job as a Lead SWE, Product Manager, or real executive.

The company failing isn't the worst thing that can happen to you as a startup employee. If you get fired after 3 months with no severance and no reference, you are fucked because no one wants to hire someone who got fired from a dogshit startup. You are actually better off making the company fail (if you can) at that point.

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