4 ms·

This never made sense to me. A startup should pay you more because if you are capable, you are giving up a lot. If you want to be part of something revolutiona

This never made sense to me. A startup should pay you more because if you are capable, you are giving up a lot. If you want to be part of something revolutionary as an early employee, I suggest a better plan. Go talk to your employer about starting something small inside the already big and solid company. Negotiate the equity and terms before getting started. If your company is too big and complex to get this going, then simply cut your hours and work part time on your product with someone else. 1% to 3% is just way too small for someone who is capable. A gal who loves this game and spends 10 years working at different startups can end up loosing $500k to a couple of millions considering she could get paid very well at big co. Note: Capable is the keyword here.

cookiecaper 11y ago
>This never made sense to me There's a lot of naive people that will allow their trust to be exploited if there's a carrot dangled in their face. Now it makes sense. Most investors will flat refuse to invest in a startup that pays anything more than low-mid-range salaries. Contrary to your theory that the greater risk should be rewarded with a greater tangible wage, I've personally seen investors pass on companies because the founder(s) wanted a 100k salary, even though it represented a 40% haircut in wage for the founder(s). While the investors don't want you to think it, and do a lot to try to stop it from being thunk, Silicon Valley and tech culture make a lot more sense when you just realize that wealthy, seasoned investors are exploiting naive, just-out-of-college young adults as practically free labor, primarily compensating them in idealism and empty promises instead of dollars.