I mean... someone has to be the first employee or first technical employee. Everyone can't be a founder. I'm ignoring the term "founding engineer" because I als

I mean... someone has to be the first employee or first technical employee. Everyone can't be a founder. I'm ignoring the term "founding engineer" because I also find it a bit disingenuous, and I consider that just a terminology fad. How do you decide how to balance that? YC/Silicon Valley has settled chiefly on near-market (~80%, it seems) rate salary and a much more significant stake (0.5-1.5%-ish, I guess) than later employees. The other factors that play into it, in my mind, are: * interested, but not ready to be a founder; by whatever definition they want to use * less "feeling" of risk as a 1st employee vs. actual risk (this one CAN'T be discounted. emotions are not rational) * wanting to have a much larger area of responsibility than they could at other companies * firmly believing in the company/founders/mission for whatever reason Those seem to be the things that come up in every discussion I remember. Let me know if I missed anything obvious.