5 ms·
A huge problem in my opinion, is employee equity and compensation. No doubt, VCs are risking their money. But when you look at the system taking a few steps bac
by zallarak 10y ago
A huge problem in my opinion, is employee equity and compensation. No doubt, VCs are risking their money. But when you look at the system taking a few steps back, you see tons of VCs have made insane mounts of money in the last decade. Enough to buy castles, sports teams, and their own private islands.
Then you look at the swaths of tech workers who were there at the early stage. I've seen multiple large exits in startups. Places I've worked at or have had close friends. People who were there at the seed stage with barely a MVP, who built products, pulled all-nighters, and worked 7 days a week. Upon acquisition, the VCs made 10s of millions, the founders made 10s of millions and the employees got new car money (for 2 years of intense work getting paid well below market).
EDIT: Another interesting point that is a bit too off-topic and lengthy for this comment is that most startups simply don't realize the value of (5+)x engineers. I've worked with people that are astronomically more efficient than entry or mid-level engineers who make 100-130K, yet they make around the same amount. Its very worth it to find these people and pay them 2-3x market and retain them. I'm not talking about algorithms wizards (although these people tend to be decent algorists too), I'm speaking of engineers who can work on all levels of the stack and ship code that is simple and works. They understand business needs and don't get caught up in self-gratifying projects. They use a mix of new and old tools, selecting them for reliability and efficiency.
- StevePerkins 10y agoThe problem with the "10X" hypothesis is that I have NEVER met an engineer in my life who believes they are a mere "X" (let alone sub-X). And quite frankly, I find the overwhelming majority of self-professed 10X'ers to be delusional assholes. How do you measure "X", anyway? During the whiteboard interview process? We all regularly discuss how subjective and broken that process is. Do you measure it after the hire, by tracking the number of story and task tickets closed? Now you just have people gaming the system, with a sprint board full of bullshit. Everyone wants more money. No one wants to work for less than a certain baseline. Everyone's pissed when they find out what their peers make. So if you're an employee who thinks you're underpaid, then test the market. And you're an employer who routinely offers great candidates many multiples of the market rate, then please let me know where I can send my resume.
- msdos 10y agoYou measure "X" with data. Like revenue generated, or cost saved, or lines of code saved, or time needed to deliver work, based on current or previous work. Is this bullshit for you?
- skybrian 10y agoYes, all of those are easy to bullshit. Someone can put them on their resume and it's not that easy to check. Why do you think we do whiteboard interviews?
- s_q_b 10y agoI'm not really sure. In a modern environment, never have I been asked to solve a business problem with: No internet access, No configured editor, With massive time pressure, In a room full of strangers, In my chicken scratch with a fat marker. It's not that whiteboard interviews are bad. They're just severely outdated. They stem from a previous time before it was cheap and easy to interview engineers on actual hardware. We know that whiteboards are a bad metric. Dozens of scientific studies show that the most effective hiring practice is a general intelligence test coupled with a work sample test. It's easy enough to create a coding problem as a work sample. Why do we test a proxy for the work, rather than the work itself?
- xkcd-sucks 10y agoBecause it's easier to gracefully reject people who are abrasive/awkward/black/gay/otherwise a bad 'culture fit?'
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- dmitrygr 10y agoExcept that will drive away most good engineers. Most good ones I know will refuse to do "take home" problems for interview purposes. I understand them. It is demeaning. When I get offered one, I send back a quote to solve their problem, at my standard contracting rate.