4 ms·

Even a hefty FAANG salary is still ~1% of what you can make once you 'escape' and carve out your own software legacy. Ironically many capable, intelligent and

Even a hefty FAANG salary is still ~1% of what you can make once you 'escape' and carve out your own software legacy. Ironically many capable, intelligent and driven people end up joining Google, et al. thinking it's the place for them ...not realizing it's where you go to (mentally) retire.

midoridensha 4y ago
>Even a hefty FAANG salary is still ~1% of what you can make once you 'escape' and carve out your own software legacy. Huh? How do you figure? No one makes ridiculous amounts of money just writing software unless they're incredibly lucky. This sounds like typical American thinking: "if you just work hard, you'll be the next Bill Gates or Steve Jobs!" Bullshit. For every guy like them, there's thousands of people who spent countless hours and sacrificing their best years working on stuff that went nowhere; they would have been better off working at a FAANG.
joshuamorton 4y ago
Where, pray tell, does one reliably make $20,000,000 a year, from day one?
cmrdporcupine 4y ago
Bunk. Every offer I've ever received from a series A or seed stage startup has had compensation and equity potentials that -- even when imagining a successful exit via IPO or acquire -- totalled (when amortized over a 5 year period) to 2/3rds or 1/2 of what I was getting at Google. There is literally no financial reason to go to an early stage startup as an employee vs going to a FAANG. The founders and VCs don't give enough equity for it to even be close to a "lottery ticket." As for forming my own startup means a) having an idea that VCs want to fund b) having connections to said VCs c) foregoing income while in the prototyping phase. I have a family to feed. I ended up leaving my Google job simply out of job satisfaction. Finances, nope. Makes no sense.
- JohnFen 4y ago
  You're thinking of a particular type of startup here. Most startups don't involve VCs, for instance. But you're right, there is a period where the founder makes little to nothing from the startup. You need to be able to weather that. And, if you're betting on the startup making you an instant millionaire, you're betting on the wrong horse. I mean, it can happen, but it's not the most likely result. The most likely result is that it will fail, and you'll have to try again with a different startup. The difference between successful founders and unsuccessful ones is the unsuccessful ones gave up. The successful ones almost always have a string of failures before the one that succeeded. That said, starting your own company can be much more profitable in the long run than working for someone else. And more fulfilling. But it's certainly not a path for everyone.

midoridensha 4y ago

>Even a hefty FAANG salary is still ~1% of what you can make once you 'escape' and carve out your own software legacy. Huh? How do you figure? No one makes ridiculous amounts of money just writing software unless they're incredibly lucky. This sounds like typical American thinking: "if you just work hard, you'll be the next Bill Gates or Steve Jobs!" Bullshit. For every guy like them, there's thousands of people who spent countless hours and sacrificing their best years working on stuff that went nowhere; they would have been better off working at a FAANG.

joshuamorton 4y ago

Where, pray tell, does one reliably make $20,000,000 a year, from day one?

cmrdporcupine 4y ago

Bunk. Every offer I've ever received from a series A or seed stage startup has had compensation and equity potentials that -- even when imagining a successful exit via IPO or acquire -- totalled (when amortized over a 5 year period) to 2/3rds or 1/2 of what I was getting at Google. There is literally no financial reason to go to an early stage startup as an employee vs going to a FAANG. The founders and VCs don't give enough equity for it to even be close to a "lottery ticket." As for forming my own startup means a) having an idea that VCs want to fund b) having connections to said VCs c) foregoing income while in the prototyping phase. I have a family to feed. I ended up leaving my Google job simply out of job satisfaction. Finances, nope. Makes no sense.

JohnFen 4y ago
You're thinking of a particular type of startup here. Most startups don't involve VCs, for instance. But you're right, there is a period where the founder makes little to nothing from the startup. You need to be able to weather that. And, if you're betting on the startup making you an instant millionaire, you're betting on the wrong horse. I mean, it can happen, but it's not the most likely result. The most likely result is that it will fail, and you'll have to try again with a different startup. The difference between successful founders and unsuccessful ones is the unsuccessful ones gave up. The successful ones almost always have a string of failures before the one that succeeded. That said, starting your own company can be much more profitable in the long run than working for someone else. And more fulfilling. But it's certainly not a path for everyone.