4 ms·

I don't understand why deadpool is better than acquihire. You would return at least the same amount of money to your investors, but also you could put this as a

by isalmon 13y ago

I don't understand why deadpool is better than acquihire. You would return at least the same amount of money to your investors, but also you could put this as an exit on your resume and get a significant amount of money personally.

jcampbell1 13y ago
Don't acquihires typically require a 3 year commitment? That could be one reason.
mathattack 13y ago
I think it's refreshing that they didn't sugarcoat it. Sometimes being blatantly honest can help. ("I had a 6 month sabbatical, look at the class I took" isn't as refreshing as, "The management team missed it's numbers. As head of sales I was let go. I took a technical class while I job hunted.")
patio11 13y ago
From an investor's perspective: all small returns round to zero. No outcome other than "Company gets absolutely massive" makes a meaningful difference to my net worth. Accordingly, if one of my CEOs said they were optimizing in the 0x to 2x range to avoid letting me down I'd tell them to do right by their team/family/self and call me when they had a new company to invest in. From a founder's perspective: If you want a job at AmaGooFaceSoft you can get one whenever you want (we're assuming you're very talented and in the current economy). If you want a house worth of money as a result of working at AmaGooFaceSoft, you can get that by getting the job and then waiting. Most people do not get into startups because they are the glide path to AmaGooFaceSoft careers. People might consider the option value of the next thing, or the certainty that the next thing will not involve a manager and HR department, higher than the (not insignificant) amount of money AmaGooFaceSoft will pay for engineers bought in quantity.
- isalmon 13y ago
  Interesting to know, thanks for sharing that. The question was coming from my personal experience when my previous company was going down and the main investor insisted on selling it for 110% of his investment. He returned his money and the rest 10% went to the founder.
kalvin 13y ago
[Ridejoy] The short answer is, we didn't prioritize having an exit on our resume, or making the most money possible on the way out. (Nothing wrong with that, we just had different priorities) Edit: +1 to patio11

by isalmon 13y ago

jcampbell1 13y ago

Don't acquihires typically require a 3 year commitment? That could be one reason.

mathattack 13y ago

I think it's refreshing that they didn't sugarcoat it. Sometimes being blatantly honest can help. ("I had a 6 month sabbatical, look at the class I took" isn't as refreshing as, "The management team missed it's numbers. As head of sales I was let go. I took a technical class while I job hunted.")

patio11 13y ago

From an investor's perspective: all small returns round to zero. No outcome other than "Company gets absolutely massive" makes a meaningful difference to my net worth. Accordingly, if one of my CEOs said they were optimizing in the 0x to 2x range to avoid letting me down I'd tell them to do right by their team/family/self and call me when they had a new company to invest in. From a founder's perspective: If you want a job at AmaGooFaceSoft you can get one whenever you want (we're assuming you're very talented and in the current economy). If you want a house worth of money as a result of working at AmaGooFaceSoft, you can get that by getting the job and then waiting. Most people do not get into startups because they are the glide path to AmaGooFaceSoft careers. People might consider the option value of the next thing, or the certainty that the next thing will not involve a manager and HR department, higher than the (not insignificant) amount of money AmaGooFaceSoft will pay for engineers bought in quantity.

isalmon 13y ago
Interesting to know, thanks for sharing that. The question was coming from my personal experience when my previous company was going down and the main investor insisted on selling it for 110% of his investment. He returned his money and the rest 10% went to the founder.

kalvin 13y ago

[Ridejoy] The short answer is, we didn't prioritize having an exit on our resume, or making the most money possible on the way out. (Nothing wrong with that, we just had different priorities) Edit: +1 to patio11