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> First, what is the environment like for exiting high-level former-FANG employees? For most employers, it will be a positive. There may be a handful of very

> First, what is the environment like for exiting high-level former-FANG employees? For most employers, it will be a positive. There may be a handful of very small startups that see it as a negative, but the reality is a very small startup is so different from a giant tech firm that the hiring team is probably correct in assuming you've never had to do something incredibly arduous without enormous support (I once had to spend 6 months reverse engineering a video output because our customer refused to tell us what it was - I ended up finding a clue on a Russian blog and I translated it with Google - this is the sort of shit you will do at an actual hard-tech underfunded startup. And if you care, it turned out to be a proprietary video signal invented in the 80s that had long since been abandoned by almost everyone so I then had to build a fucking circuit to decode it). > Second, what are some of the surprises post-FANG that I would be in for if I wanted to start a company? Your reputation will help you with investors, but it will not help you with reality. Starting a company is much harder than you think it is - no matter how hard you think it is; it's harder. That thing I said above about reverse engineering a proprietary video signal because our customer was impossible? That was one of the most enjoyable parts of my job. If you want to start a company, and you're able to do so (don't put your family savings into jeopardy over this), go for it! Just realize it's not going to be anything like a giant tech firm, where you don't realize they actually do 99% of the job for you. It will be far more rewarding. It will be far more stressful. There is an extraordinarily high chance of failure. You will likely make friends with new peers, and likely ruin some relationships in the process. The best advice I can give anyone that wants to start a company: ask yourself why do you want to start a company? If the reason is anything other than "there is this huge problem that needs to be solved and I know a way to do it!" then you are chasing a bandwagon of the glory that comes from being a successful technology entrepreneur, and aren't actually building a company with any value behind it.

ghaff 7y ago
I did sort of the reverse. I went from a very small firm in a somewhat related field to a larger (but not huge at the time) company. On the one hand, there's so much "machinery" in place to help you. On the other, it's big--and things like communication take a lot of repetitive work.
gumby 7y ago
I've found FAANG experience typically a negative in hiring. (note: "typically" not "always"). That kind of big company experience doesn't really prepare you for the day-to-day, frantic, resource-starved environment of most startups. The consequence of most decisions is more immediate* -- and can be company-killing. Whereas at any big company there's rarely true pressure (lots of pressure, very much so, but in my gf's experience mostly due to poor planning or politics leading to "must have immediately"). I think this is why ex-FAANG folks, in particular ex-googlers for some reason, are caught out as startup CEOs and almost always (or always?) fail -- the things they've learned just don't apply. Doesn't mean they aren't smart, thoughtful, hard working etc; it's more like having to write poetry in a related but different language from the one you grew up in, and one you have never actually spoken. Someone who's left a big company and successfully gone to some other small company can be great -- let them make their mistakes and screen themselves out on someone else's dime. Or someone who worked already at a startup, went (perhaps through purchase) to a big company and wanted back into the fray. * I'm a startup only guy and my gf has worked at most of the big guys (FB, Goog, msft, LinkedIn, Amazon). I would hate the idea of working for any of those companies and she would not really be comfortable with the uncertainty I face all the time, even when the startup is well funded. Neither of us is wrong.
- bob33212 7y ago
  Very few startups have failed because the coders couldn't solve a algorithms problem in 45 minutes. A lot of startups have failed because the coders built something that didn't have a large market, or didn't compete well with existing competition. The big O of a function matters when you have 100 million users, not so much when you are struggling to get 1 user.
  - foobiekr 7y ago
    My personal observations tell me that what happens with a lot of ex-googlites specifically is that they go to or found a startup and say something along the lines of “well, first I need to rebuild both on and the other google infra, and then I can finally start working on my business...” It’s just the wrong mindset.
- 7y ago
alasdair_ 7y ago
> Just realize it's not going to be anything like a giant tech firm, where you don't realize they actually do 99% of the job for you. This. So much this. All those teams of devops people, the SREs, the QA people, the network engineers and all the other unsung heroes don't exist in a startup yet the people who only ever worked at BigCo assume that they do and so forget about all of the problems involved in building a codebase that can scale in a meaningful way because it's always been someone else's job and they have been focused solely on their KPI or singular deliverable. All that build infrastructure or coding standards or documentation or monitoring systems that you took for granted at Google or Facebook? None of it exists. Not only that - you won't be rewarded for building it, instead you'll be asked why the next person to come behind you got their work done faster than you did.
- scarejunba 7y ago
  > All that build infrastructure or coding standards or documentation or monitoring systems that you took for granted at Google or Facebook? None of it exists. Not only that - you won't be rewarded for building it, instead you'll be asked why the next person to come behind you got their work done faster than you did. Not necessarily like that, but yes, almost. For instance, if someone sat down and spent a month writing documentation for shit we might pivot from in two, I must fire myself for having let it happen. Just wasting money and (perhaps more importantly) time. I've definitely seen what you're saying happen, though. Lots of FAANG engineers not experienced in how things come to be. - "Why don't we have blue/green deploys?" - "Great idea. What will it help us with and how can we make it happen?" That's likely to happen. Someone else speccing out a deploy system for you with canaries or b/g or whatever so you can go write some code isn't going to. You're hopefully independent enough to make the case, build the thing fast enough that it's worth it to the business, and have it running.
  - ehnto 7y ago
    It can get a bit cumbersome. Especially for people coming fresh into an agency environment. You are going to have to learn a dozen different build pipelines and tech stacks by the time you are done at the agency. We are absolutely aware of blue green deploys or whatever it may be, in fact client X had it, they are gone now though and our most recent inherited code base uses cloud formation to spin up feature specific environments instead, have fun learning that and then never using it again. We work hard to normalize tech stacks and deploys as they come in, but it is always a cost/benefit tradeoff and very often "leave it alone" is the clients choice.
taneq 7y ago
> (I once had to spend 6 months reverse engineering a video output because our customer refused to tell us what it was [...] so I then had to build a fucking circuit to decode it). This sounds like fun, tbh. Maybe I just have a weird sense of fun. > it's not going to be anything like a giant tech firm, where you don't realize they actually do 99% of the job for you 100% true. I've gained a huge appreciation of all of the things that a company does for its employees that they don't even realise is happening.
- alexgmcm 7y ago
  It'd be fun as a side project - with tough deadlines in a start-up and having to continually explain why it's still not finished this sprint... not so much.
ma2rten 7y ago
> I once had to spend 6 months reverse engineering a video output [...] this is the sort of shit you will do at an actual hard-tech startup I don't know about hard-tech, but it seems to me that most startups can't afford to have a person work on one project for 6 months.
- StavrosK 7y ago
  It depends on how important the project is, obviously.
- C1sc0cat 7y ago
  Not all start-ups are simple crud web apps
  - Will_Parker 7y ago
    Some of them are complicated crud web apps.
smadurange 7y ago
Loved that story about the video decoder. Simply brilliant :) All the best!
cubicmeter 7y ago
" Starting a company is much harder than you think it is - no matter how hard you think it is; it's harder." This is very true, I wish there was an easier way to start.
mratzloff 7y ago
FAANG is about the worst preparation possible for starting a company. The skillsets are completely different, and in many ways diametrically opposed. I'd suggest working for an early-stage startup before starting your own (e.g., 5-10 people). Or step down gradually. Work at a company with 50-100 people, then 5-10. Companies and roles are very different at different orders of magnitude.
- redredrobot 7y ago
  I don't know. I moved from AWS to a <10 person startup and it has a very similar feel.
SchoolboyBlue 7y ago
> The best advice I can give anyone that wants to start a company: ask yourself why do you want to start a company? If the reason is anything other than "there is this huge problem that needs to be solved and I know a way to do it!" then you are chasing a bandwagon of the glory that comes from being a successful technology entrepreneur, and aren't actually building a company with any value behind it. Couldn't agree more.

ghaff 7y ago

I did sort of the reverse. I went from a very small firm in a somewhat related field to a larger (but not huge at the time) company. On the one hand, there's so much "machinery" in place to help you. On the other, it's big--and things like communication take a lot of repetitive work.

gumby 7y ago

I've found FAANG experience typically a negative in hiring. (note: "typically" not "always"). That kind of big company experience doesn't really prepare you for the day-to-day, frantic, resource-starved environment of most startups. The consequence of most decisions is more immediate* -- and can be company-killing. Whereas at any big company there's rarely true pressure (lots of pressure, very much so, but in my gf's experience mostly due to poor planning or politics leading to "must have immediately"). I think this is why ex-FAANG folks, in particular ex-googlers for some reason, are caught out as startup CEOs and almost always (or always?) fail -- the things they've learned just don't apply. Doesn't mean they aren't smart, thoughtful, hard working etc; it's more like having to write poetry in a related but different language from the one you grew up in, and one you have never actually spoken. Someone who's left a big company and successfully gone to some other small company can be great -- let them make their mistakes and screen themselves out on someone else's dime. Or someone who worked already at a startup, went (perhaps through purchase) to a big company and wanted back into the fray. * I'm a startup only guy and my gf has worked at most of the big guys (FB, Goog, msft, LinkedIn, Amazon). I would hate the idea of working for any of those companies and she would not really be comfortable with the uncertainty I face all the time, even when the startup is well funded. Neither of us is wrong.

bob33212 7y ago
Very few startups have failed because the coders couldn't solve a algorithms problem in 45 minutes. A lot of startups have failed because the coders built something that didn't have a large market, or didn't compete well with existing competition. The big O of a function matters when you have 100 million users, not so much when you are struggling to get 1 user.
- foobiekr 7y ago
  My personal observations tell me that what happens with a lot of ex-googlites specifically is that they go to or found a startup and say something along the lines of “well, first I need to rebuild both on and the other google infra, and then I can finally start working on my business...” It’s just the wrong mindset.
7y ago

alasdair_ 7y ago

> Just realize it's not going to be anything like a giant tech firm, where you don't realize they actually do 99% of the job for you. This. So much this. All those teams of devops people, the SREs, the QA people, the network engineers and all the other unsung heroes don't exist in a startup yet the people who only ever worked at BigCo assume that they do and so forget about all of the problems involved in building a codebase that can scale in a meaningful way because it's always been someone else's job and they have been focused solely on their KPI or singular deliverable. All that build infrastructure or coding standards or documentation or monitoring systems that you took for granted at Google or Facebook? None of it exists. Not only that - you won't be rewarded for building it, instead you'll be asked why the next person to come behind you got their work done faster than you did.

scarejunba 7y ago
> All that build infrastructure or coding standards or documentation or monitoring systems that you took for granted at Google or Facebook? None of it exists. Not only that - you won't be rewarded for building it, instead you'll be asked why the next person to come behind you got their work done faster than you did. Not necessarily like that, but yes, almost. For instance, if someone sat down and spent a month writing documentation for shit we might pivot from in two, I must fire myself for having let it happen. Just wasting money and (perhaps more importantly) time. I've definitely seen what you're saying happen, though. Lots of FAANG engineers not experienced in how things come to be. - "Why don't we have blue/green deploys?" - "Great idea. What will it help us with and how can we make it happen?" That's likely to happen. Someone else speccing out a deploy system for you with canaries or b/g or whatever so you can go write some code isn't going to. You're hopefully independent enough to make the case, build the thing fast enough that it's worth it to the business, and have it running.
- ehnto 7y ago
  It can get a bit cumbersome. Especially for people coming fresh into an agency environment. You are going to have to learn a dozen different build pipelines and tech stacks by the time you are done at the agency. We are absolutely aware of blue green deploys or whatever it may be, in fact client X had it, they are gone now though and our most recent inherited code base uses cloud formation to spin up feature specific environments instead, have fun learning that and then never using it again. We work hard to normalize tech stacks and deploys as they come in, but it is always a cost/benefit tradeoff and very often "leave it alone" is the clients choice.

taneq 7y ago

> (I once had to spend 6 months reverse engineering a video output because our customer refused to tell us what it was [...] so I then had to build a fucking circuit to decode it). This sounds like fun, tbh. Maybe I just have a weird sense of fun. > it's not going to be anything like a giant tech firm, where you don't realize they actually do 99% of the job for you 100% true. I've gained a huge appreciation of all of the things that a company does for its employees that they don't even realise is happening.

alexgmcm 7y ago
It'd be fun as a side project - with tough deadlines in a start-up and having to continually explain why it's still not finished this sprint... not so much.

ma2rten 7y ago

> I once had to spend 6 months reverse engineering a video output [...] this is the sort of shit you will do at an actual hard-tech startup I don't know about hard-tech, but it seems to me that most startups can't afford to have a person work on one project for 6 months.

StavrosK 7y ago
It depends on how important the project is, obviously.
C1sc0cat 7y ago
Not all start-ups are simple crud web apps
- Will_Parker 7y ago
  Some of them are complicated crud web apps.

smadurange 7y ago

Loved that story about the video decoder. Simply brilliant :) All the best!

cubicmeter 7y ago

" Starting a company is much harder than you think it is - no matter how hard you think it is; it's harder." This is very true, I wish there was an easier way to start.

mratzloff 7y ago

FAANG is about the worst preparation possible for starting a company. The skillsets are completely different, and in many ways diametrically opposed. I'd suggest working for an early-stage startup before starting your own (e.g., 5-10 people). Or step down gradually. Work at a company with 50-100 people, then 5-10. Companies and roles are very different at different orders of magnitude.

redredrobot 7y ago
I don't know. I moved from AWS to a <10 person startup and it has a very similar feel.

SchoolboyBlue 7y ago

> The best advice I can give anyone that wants to start a company: ask yourself why do you want to start a company? If the reason is anything other than "there is this huge problem that needs to be solved and I know a way to do it!" then you are chasing a bandwagon of the glory that comes from being a successful technology entrepreneur, and aren't actually building a company with any value behind it. Couldn't agree more.