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Usually: - Significant equity - Flexible hours - Usually less bureaucracy and politics - More opportunity to make a critical impact as an individual contrib

by throwaway2016a 9y ago

Usually: - Significant equity - Flexible hours - Usually less bureaucracy and politics - More opportunity to make a critical impact as an individual contributor - Usually a higher job title (senior becomes principal, principal becomes director or VP) Those last two have been a huge help in my career. Early in my career I got a huge amount of experience that would take much much longer at a larger company. And the job title thing adds a bit of a "fake it until you make it" thing. But it came at the price of a lot more stress and less work-life balance. Whether it is worth it is up to you. I used to think it was but I'm not so sure anymore. Edit: Added a note on job title.

dagw 9y ago
- Flexible hours Only to the extent that you get do decide exactly which 14 hours you want to work each day (except when there is a 2am emergency of course)
- throwaway2016a 9y ago
  Some (small) percentage of people would actually prefer to work 14 hours starting at 11 AM than 8 hours starting at 7:30 AM. But... I learned something at my first few startups... if you are working 14 hours consistently: 1. You will get burnt out quickly 2. Probably only 6 of those hours are productive. If you tell employees to work 14 hours they will record 14 hours in their time sheet but they are probably not actually "working" effectively. Now as the CTO of a startup I consider it my personal mission to grow and improve the product by making sure the team workers more efficient not longer hours. I get the same 6 productive hours out of the team and much happier employees. In fact, it could be a coincidence, but this go around we ship features faster and have less bugs then when I was at a company that demanded 12+ hours. With that said, I also grew a lot as a person and manager during that time. And learned what is effective and what is ineffective uses of time. If you aren't able to answer the question of what will have the largest impact and what is the best use of time than it is easy to end up with people working 80 hour weeks.
watwut 9y ago
> Usually less bureaucracy and politics Untrue. Less politics comes from good experienced management and leadership. The more chaos (startups), the more politics. Imo, tech only people who dont navigate politics well are best off in middle sized companies. I also disagree on flexible hours. Startups are flexible in that you can come late in the morning. You rarely can leave sooner (even if you come in very soon) without major hit and you are expected to participate in more non-work social activities (adding to total inflexible hours). But yeah, higher job title might be a benefit.

dagw 9y ago

- Flexible hours Only to the extent that you get do decide exactly which 14 hours you want to work each day (except when there is a 2am emergency of course)

throwaway2016a 9y ago
Some (small) percentage of people would actually prefer to work 14 hours starting at 11 AM than 8 hours starting at 7:30 AM. But... I learned something at my first few startups... if you are working 14 hours consistently: 1. You will get burnt out quickly 2. Probably only 6 of those hours are productive. If you tell employees to work 14 hours they will record 14 hours in their time sheet but they are probably not actually "working" effectively. Now as the CTO of a startup I consider it my personal mission to grow and improve the product by making sure the team workers more efficient not longer hours. I get the same 6 productive hours out of the team and much happier employees. In fact, it could be a coincidence, but this go around we ship features faster and have less bugs then when I was at a company that demanded 12+ hours. With that said, I also grew a lot as a person and manager during that time. And learned what is effective and what is ineffective uses of time. If you aren't able to answer the question of what will have the largest impact and what is the best use of time than it is easy to end up with people working 80 hour weeks.

watwut 9y ago

> Usually less bureaucracy and politics Untrue. Less politics comes from good experienced management and leadership. The more chaos (startups), the more politics. Imo, tech only people who dont navigate politics well are best off in middle sized companies. I also disagree on flexible hours. Startups are flexible in that you can come late in the morning. You rarely can leave sooner (even if you come in very soon) without major hit and you are expected to participate in more non-work social activities (adding to total inflexible hours). But yeah, higher job title might be a benefit.