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I'd be interested in knowing more of some of the pitfalls you briefly mention in dealing with VCs and the world of startups in general. An article, somewhere, a

I'd be interested in knowing more of some of the pitfalls you briefly mention in dealing with VCs and the world of startups in general. An article, somewhere, anywhere, would be nice.

michaelochurch 13y ago
VC pitfalls have been covered several times over. Most of my knowledge of that world is through friends who've tried to raise. I was technically a co-founder in my first startup, but the CEO had raised before (~40M in the '90s) and so I let him handle that. I'm not a fan of that CEO-- he got me to spend 3 years of my life on a project that had no chance; even though he was perennially "on the cusp of" funding, he was also under a VC blackball-- but I'm also not a fan of what his '90s ex-investors did to him. Whether the man deserved it, I can't say. It looks like there was pretty major fault on all sides. On the employee angle, here's a blog post I wrote a year and a half ago: http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2012/07/08/dont-waste-your-time-in-crappy-startup-jobs/ http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2012/07/08/dont-waste-yo... What I would say is to avoid falling prey to the exceptionalism, the "yes, we pay poorly but we're changing the world" nonsense. If they value you, they'll pay you. If they say they absolutely can't afford more than 0.05% for an engineer, either they're lying or they did a terrible job of negotiating with investors (and the founders no longer call the shots). Don't make excuses for shitty people and companies; just leave them. The same principles that apply in big companies apply in small ones. You'll have good bosses and bad. (Young startups tend to have more bad ones.) Focus on your career goals, and always watch your back a little bit. Don't sacrifice your career, reputation, network or anything else for a company, ever. It wouldn't do the same for you.

I'd be interested in knowing more of some of the pitfalls you briefly mention in dealing with VCs and the world of startups in general. An article, somewhere, anywhere, would be nice.

michaelochurch 13y ago

VC pitfalls have been covered several times over. Most of my knowledge of that world is through friends who've tried to raise. I was technically a co-founder in my first startup, but the CEO had raised before (~40M in the '90s) and so I let him handle that. I'm not a fan of that CEO-- he got me to spend 3 years of my life on a project that had no chance; even though he was perennially "on the cusp of" funding, he was also under a VC blackball-- but I'm also not a fan of what his '90s ex-investors did to him. Whether the man deserved it, I can't say. It looks like there was pretty major fault on all sides. On the employee angle, here's a blog post I wrote a year and a half ago: http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2012/07/08/dont-waste-your-time-in-crappy-startup-jobs/ http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2012/07/08/dont-waste-yo... What I would say is to avoid falling prey to the exceptionalism, the "yes, we pay poorly but we're changing the world" nonsense. If they value you, they'll pay you. If they say they absolutely can't afford more than 0.05% for an engineer, either they're lying or they did a terrible job of negotiating with investors (and the founders no longer call the shots). Don't make excuses for shitty people and companies; just leave them. The same principles that apply in big companies apply in small ones. You'll have good bosses and bad. (Young startups tend to have more bad ones.) Focus on your career goals, and always watch your back a little bit. Don't sacrifice your career, reputation, network or anything else for a company, ever. It wouldn't do the same for you.