Getting promoted to L6 at Google is a winning lottery ticket! Most people at Google never reach level 6. I got options priced at 12c that were valued at 35c by

Getting promoted to L6 at Google is a winning lottery ticket! Most people at Google never reach level 6. I got options priced at 12c that were valued at 35c by the time they vested, $1.50 when I quit and exercised and paid AMT, and $5 at IPO. This transpired over a span of about 5 years. This company was successful but not clearly profitable when I joined. Maybe I got lucky picking a winner, but I'm not a famous (or highly talented) engineer and I didn't cast a wide net when job hunting. OTOH, I got another job offer years earlier where the employer tried to match a $15/yr gap in salary with an offer to buy $15k strike price options! The clear deception in how the VP presented the economic interpretation of the options was a factor in my decision to decline.