Your going rate at established companies is probably simply your going rate. Start there; it's what the market values your services at. That number is your floor, not your ceiling.

At a financed, leveraged startup, you're not going to get that number in cash. But you need to get that number, risk-adjusted, in some fashion. Generally, engineers should not expect to be "worth less" to startups. They're just compensated using different instruments.

The problem with berating engineers for framing comp discussions in terms of their going rate is that engineers can't value equity the way founders can. It's an asymmetric information problem. The founders know more about the value of their equity and have more control over the variables that will change those values. So the onus is on the company, not the candidate, to justify the equity grants being used to offset salary.

The way that should probably work for most startups is a conversation about expected future revenues. Acquired startups aren't really valued in terms of forward revenue multiples, but that is the scoring system used by most bystanders to evaluate a deal. So a compensation discussion that involves equity should involve quarterly revenue projections and a notion of what multiple of that revenue the company might be acquired at (or, if you're shooting for Mars and not the moon, where you'd IPO at --- but the IPO story is usually so B.S. that it's a warning sign).

A founder who can't have that conversation with a candidate or can't do it convincingly has no business trying to sell equity to a candidate. Which, make no mistake, is exactly what founders are doing when they compensate employees with equity: they are selling stock in their company, and it's the least valuable stock in the company.

> At a financed, leveraged startup, you're not going to get that number in cash. But you need to get that number, risk-adjusted, in some fashion. Generally, engineers should not expect to be "worth less" to startups. They're just compensated using different instruments.

Completely agree.

> The problem with berating engineers for framing comp discussions in terms of their going rate is that engineers can't value equity the way founders can. It's an asymmetric information problem. The founders know more about the value of their equity and have more control over the variables that will change those values.

And this is the part where I personally believe in 100% transparency. I am here to build a business that will make everyone involved happy. I am not afraid to show you the things that are going well, or the things that are going terrible or to share any other number with you. Of course, you don't know if I am lying to you or not. But guess what? The same is true of any job. It is naive of the founder to believe that they can permanently hide the state of the startup to the people they are hiring. If I lied to you, you will find out soon enough and leave. There are so many amazing startups in Silicon Valley, that is dumb for a founder to lie about these things. So the better approach is to be 100% transparent from the beginning.

That's great, and I believe you, but you should know when you write things like this that every startup founder ever says the same thing. You can make a more compelling case with actual numbers.

The bigger issue though is, when someone comes in too expensive for you to hire, that's not a flaw in them. I am guessing you hire fewer people than I do, so, words and words and words to the wise: people are going to come in higher than you can afford. Some of them will be people you'd want to hire, others not. You are probably no more reliable at valuing them than they are. Don't get irritated about it and don't preach. Just shrug and walk away. Thank them for their time. Don't get mad at them for wasting your time. If you are serious about recruiting, nobody can waste your time. And nobody looks good trying to tell people they're worth less than they think they are. Ever.

At your going rate, I would expect some not much. The risk of start up failure is greater than the risk of lay offs and large company failure(in a time frame that would be relevant to an employee who values the safety of large company life.)