What's the benefit of a startup? Seems like more hours for less pay while always needing to get things done. I fail to see the appeal. They just have lunches and dinners which appeal to people.

Never getting a raise because that's not built into their budget and there's not a system around it. Having to beg for vacation time and getting maybe a week a year. And after a few years or a few ventures, your friends at big corps are already starting to talk about retirement and pensions, and you realize that's an extra million you gave up. But hey, you can wear shorts!

I work for fortune 300 non tech company (despite their NASDAQ listing). Our pension program has been frozen - no new employees can join and years of service no longer accrue additional benefit. There has not been a 401k match in four years, the continuing education program ended with the merger 10 years ago. And the healthcare is marginally better than Obamacare. And raises. Last year they were 0.75%.

A startup looks better and better.

I'm guessing when most people [on HN] are comparing big companies to startups they're thinking of tech companies. What you describe may not be unusual for large non-tech companies - but it's pretty horrible compared to large tech ones.

If it's feasible you may want to consider looking for a new job. [And FWIW some great advice I got when starting out as a developer was never work where software is a cost-center].

This cost-center point is key. I work for one of the big international electronics corps as an enterprise web dev, but they have no interest in the quality of our work. They don't understand it, they have no belief in codebase maintainability (everything is new development or bugfix, basically as soon as an app is written it becomes frozen legacy code that will sit for 5+ years until a rewrite is finally budgeted).

A lot of the superiors they hire really affect the architectural policies of the company. For example, we can use Spring & jQuery but little else. Now they are trying to write apps with heavier front-end & getting into trouble cuz its a mess of jQuery callbacks with no real js framework. Why? The main architect has never heard of React, Angular, backbone, etc. (not to mention the fact that I'm one of like 2 devs who can actually write js, and unfortunately the other does not possess the equally rare skill: "uses proper design patterns"). You'd think I was joking until you met a bunch of corporate consultant programmers.

Basically, these companies try to boil web development into an old-school "IT" process but the level of intellect is astonishingly low. I've been lookin for a new gig at a tech company for quite a while but it was tough to make a change cuz this is my first gig out of grad school, had to prove myself a bit & build resume.

The only relief is that the corp "cost-center" IT kindof job I have is such a mess that its a good place to study & relax, pace of work is veeeeery slow.

> I've been lookin for a new gig at a tech company for quite a while but it was tough to make a change cuz this is my first gig out of grad school, had to prove myself a bit & build resume.

Why not try to apply for some jobs now? You don't know how good your resume is until you try it

heh thanks for the words of encouragement. i'm going to try now, yes. but basically.... to be fair i'm getting paid a pretty good wage so i really just need some experience to avoid looking like a dabbler. I'm looking at senior level positions now & they seem to want to see that you're really committed to a certain type of code.

I went from research Matlab / dabbling in C# at a dayjob, to RoR, to javascript, to now pretty hardcore backend Java (EE, Spring, high concurrency for last 2 yrs), trying to move into Clojure a bit more. Most well-funded companies don't seem to like polyglots from what I can tell... But yeah I will be looking for the ones that do, plus I am studying C++ to make a bit of a more lateral move into audio digital signal processing / data-mining / machine learning.

I don't know... companies tell me I'm too expensive for the level of experience I have, yet all the high-paid seniors I work with are awful so I don't want to lower my salary expectations unless I can find a company thats actually worth sacrificing for.

Retiring in your 30's? What an age we live in. What an industry we work in.

I work at a startup and I am 25. I have saved up some money and seriously considering retirement by the time I am 30.

Not that I have a lot of money saved up. I just have a couple of thousand bucks. Nothing fancy. But to me it is a seed money to try out new things, at an age where making huge mistakes wouldn't result in me being 70 and penniless. There will still be enough time to return back to IT once (if) I fail miserably. And it will also be an extended break in the worst case.

I want to explore the world, jobs, hobbies, people. I have realized the 8 hours everyday I spend on my desk is the best time to be out and about. The sunshine is literally gone by the time I get off work. If this is what hundreds of years of progress and planning has led to, I think we have failed.

So yes, I support people who think about retiring early, and actually living their lives when they are still young. If youth is the best time of one's life, it shouldn't be wasted on the desk.

>So yes, I support people who think about retiring early. If youth is the best time of one's life, it shouldn't be wasted on the desk

It's funny, the different perspectives people have on retirement.

I don't plan on ever retiring. What would I do? Very much the same things I'm already doing. I've tried to organize my life that way.

I agree. I'll only retire when my body gives out. I decided what kind of old man I want to be and I won't be one of those hunched and shriveled guys. I intend on making it to 140. People who retire die.

Ahh, to be 25 and single again. Trust me by the time you're 35 and have kids you'll have a different sense of what's important. Your kids will be your sunshine but also your responsibility. Early retirement, living on a couple thousand dollars a year, will seem like the dumbest idea ever.

>Ahh, to be 25 and single again. Trust me by the time you're 35 and have kids you'll have a different sense of what's important. Your kids will be your sunshine but also your responsibility. Early retirement, living on a couple thousand dollars a year, will seem like the dumbest idea ever.

That's a choice that a 25 year old need not make.

For those of us who have hit or are even beyond 35, and chose not to have kids, things look very different. Particularly if you work in North American IT, you're able to funnel all of that extra disposable income into things like early retirement, as well as improving your day-to-day quality of life (that could be vacations, gadgets, whatever you'd like...).

Yes, don't get me wrong, I think it's great to have early retirement as a goal, and maybe even try it out for a while (it was my goal from an early age and I tried it out for three years in my late 20's / early 30's). It's excellent motivation to save money when you're starting out.

And I was in the same boat; when backpacking through Thailand I thought, "Thailand is cheap, I'll just raise a family here". Well sure, for backpackers it's easy to live on 3K per year. But with a couple kids, you'll likely want a safe car (stupidly expensive there), decent schools (again), something nicer than a backpacker hostel, etc. Heck, flights home to visit family will run close to 10K per year alone.

A couple of thousand? 9k won't even allow you to retire in Afghanistan.

:-)

Retiring at 30 = being a boring person for your 40s, 50s, etc.

I think a better situation is to be financially secure by your 30s (be completely out of debt, pay off a mortgage, have money for children, etc.) and then have the ability to start companies or work freelance for the rest of your life rather than being a slave to the 9-to-5 grind.

I do like the concept of getting rich slowly and learning slowly. I would love to peruse multiple degrees (I already have two) just out of the love of learning and also meeting other lovers of knowledge.

I think you simply value the work environment much more than anyone that "retires" at 30, much similar to people that continue to work after winning a large lottery. And that's ok. For most people that want extremely early retirement, though, it is time to spend with family: Time to learn: time to experience. Not a lot of people acheive this, but that's the dream.

You probably need ~1.7 to 2.5 million to retire, and even that's not going to be at 30

depends on the lifestyle you want to live.

My wife and I might retire in our mid-30s, in the US but not in an expensive area, and be completely comfortable with well under $1 million in assets. Because we live a laid back, low cost lifestyle -- with the house paid off (as of this week) our burn rate is dropping to under $20k per year.

You might need considerably more money to maintain your desired lifestyle. There's nothing wrong with that -- but recognize that not everyone is you.

May I ask what is your definition of retirement? I just can't imagine to stop working at that age (maybe it's because I haven't even started).

raise the kids. Make indie games, with the understanding that it doesn't matter if they never make significant revenue. Write. Read. Study. The key point here is really "not needing to earn more money" rather than "not doing anything".

> If this is what hundreds of years of progress and planning has led to, I think we have failed.

You're saying this after complaining spending eight hours a day (presumably five days a week) at your desk. That leaves far more leisure time than most [working class] people had "hundreds of years" ago.

While this comparison is true for 100-200 year ago industrial jobs, and farming in subsistence conditions, the original hunter gatherers had plenty of free time, and that's what we're evolved for. Main problem is, there's to many of us for hunting and gathering to be sustainable...

a couple hundred thousand is not enough to retire at 30 though ....

He is 25, and he plans to retire at 30, in 5 years he may save another couple thousands more. Let's put on the lower part of the "couple" spectrum and say he have 200.000, in 5 years he will have 400.000 USD. This money is enough to retire early with the 4% rule http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2012/05/29/how-much-do-i-need...

Maybe you are assuming that he want to live in the states, with the interest of this money he could live easily in Spain, Thailand, Argentina, etc...

When someone says "a couple thousand" you think of 200k as a lower bound?

The English colloquialisms "a couple" or "a few" are generally accepted to mean 1 < x < 5.

A couple and a couple of hundred are quite different though!

The original post suggests ~$2000, not ~200k

thailand maybe - spain seems like a stretch

It can be [1]. Instead of saving 10-15% of your income, suppose you cut your expenses drastically and started saving 80% of your income. The math works out that you will be financially independent within 5-7 years and no longer have a requirement to work for money.

[1] http://earlyretirementextreme.com

Note he said a couple thousand, not a couple hundred thousand.

I personally would not do a startup, unless I was one of the founders. Or they provided me with a non-nedglible equity stake or the best salary I could get.

Most developers get tiny, tiny amounts of equity at startups which don't pay off in the end.

And the appeal of "interesting work", soon dissipates when your up against deadlines, and the focus is speed not quality code. As is in most startups.

Just working at a successful startup won't automatically bring success, you have to be in a position to capture that success. The easiest way to do that, is be a founder.

Could you attach some numbers to what you consider tiny and adequate equity?

Simple bit of math from much earlier in my career:

* Google salary is $180k

* Startup salary is $125k

Expected value of stock options must be >$55k per year to be economically equal. If we assume 5 years to exit, 20% odds of successful exit, and $50 million exit, that means I must own about 3% of the company at the time of exit, assuming I have no risk aversion (and more if I do). Assuming reasonable dilution over the 5 years, I need to get substantially more than 3% today.

In most cases, only founders get that level of equity. The equity offered to future employees is, quite frankly, a complete joke for most startups I've seen. The assumption is that there aren't enough developers who can't value options well that some sucker is gonna get fleeced.

That doesn't make startup the wrong option (I went with it), but the incentives have to be non-financial. Startups can be great or horrible places to learn, depending on how much exposure you have to business processes and similar. In Google, you're in a specialized box. In startups, you can see many more aspects of the operation. Getting into a position with that kind of visibility, however, can be difficult to properly negotiate early in the career.

> Could you attach some numbers to what you consider tiny and adequate equity?

That depends entirely on the company and the developer, there are no absolute numbers. Keep in mind though that often it's entirely fair that even the earliest employees get vastly less than the founders. After all, they probably didn't spend the last three years living in their parents' basement to get the business to the point of being viable for full-time employee #1. E.g. I think it took Kickstarter something like seven years to actually get to launch.

For a typical startup, anything less than 5-10% for a first engineer (non founder) is tiny, negligible, and just not worth suffering (lower salary, lost health, long hours) a startup for. Of course, there are startups that offer decent salaries and normal working hours. They're just rare. In those cases, equity isn't necessarily an issue and even no equity can be just fine.

For me, there's no amount of equity that would be "adequate" - if a company wants to include some in an offer, great, but it's not going to be a factor in my decision.

Most likely the equity will be worth nothing or very little - I thus value it at zero so I'm not willing to give up any amount of salary for it.

I tend to agree with you in that I do not weigh a decision based on the amount of equity they are offering. A little side story as to why I do not weigh equity as I used to. Back in the first bubble (1998-2000) I went to work for a startup that had good leadership, big investors, and really came to define the SaaS model (although we called it an Application Service Provider at the time). I took a slight pay cut to come to work there, but I saw upside and they offered me a great equity package. A year and half down the road we were growing and planning to go public. They had not planned well and given out too much equity. Prior to the IPO we had to do an 8 to 1 reverse split, meaning that for every 8 shares you had you now had 1. Although the IPO was fairly successful out of the gate, moral was destroyed by the reverse split.

However, with that in mind, I will still give up salary in return for equity if I am (a) passionate about the business idea, (b) believe that there is a good chance that the business will succeed, (c) believe in the founders and team that is already in place, including any investors. And looking back (I am in my 40s now) the younger you are the more risk you can absorb in terms of equity. I enjoy the startup world and am willing to take risks. Plus, like any other job if it doesn't look like it is panning out or you are unhappy there is nothing holding you there.

I like equity for what it does to me. It makes me primal and on top of my game. It helps me continue to give a shit. All these things benefit me because instead of wasting time (On HN :P) I am focused on delivering and increasing the leverage of my contributions to my team (ie, Making bigger moves) .

Probably would be better for your career if you learned how to motivate intrinsically, rather than relying on carrots and sticks. At some point the carrot is going to disappear, and you'll realize that the folks holding the stick made off like bandits.

The very "needing to get things done" is the appeal - even if the pay is lower (which isn't always the case these days) think of it as investing in your own abilities and skills.

I spent all my days, nights, and weekends out of college working on a doomed startup during the first bubble and I'd still describe it as one of the best experiences of my life. It prepared me for all sorts of experiences since then. I was ideating, researching, designing, building, and even publicly presenting multiple new products for a company that didn't have the staff to specialize in any of those needs.

I've used those skills at companies big and small since then and have worked alongside those who haven't forged their abilities in the pressure-cooker of a startup - I wouldn't change a thing.

The real appeal to a startup has little to do with compensation. It's about "benefits" and intangibles. Obviously these will vary depending on the degree to how "start-upy" your company is but I think you can measure it most by the size. In the extreme example, when you start your own company, you own it all. You want casual Fridays? It's done. You want a remote/results-only workplace policy? It's done. Cubicles, private offices, or wide open desk farms - you pick.

From a developer's perspective, you don't have to support someone else's code (at least for now). It's YOUR code - but it's also YOUR bug when they do come up. It's much less stressful fixing your own bugs then a "senior" developer who's worked there for 15 years and supposedly knows what he's doing but fails to take responsibility.

I previously worked at a large ad tech startup (using that term loosely, they had just gone public and had about 250 people) and it drove me nuts. Particularly, it was the strain of having to work for someone I didn't respect. I left and now run a company with some friends - all of whom I believe to be smarter than I. There is no better feeling than being the dumbest one in the room. That is a luxury rarely afforded at large companies. Invariably, you're going to end up with people at the bottom of the barrel. When you're the owner/boss/hiring manager - you get to pick the people you work with.

TL;DR: Startups aren't about compensation it's about the enjoyment of picking the workplace you want to be in. You don't have to worry about working with people you dislike, because you pick them all!

Edit: Also forgot to mention, I have learned exponentially more in the last 2 years of running my business than I feel like in the rest of my life combined. It's like software development/product management/sales special forces training - you really end up pushing yourself to do more than you thought you were capable of. Mostly because there is no one else to pick up your slack.

Big companies provide better benefits, in tangible terms. A lot big/medium companies now have flexi-time, days to work remote. You probably won't get free pizza, but with the extra pay you can buy your own.

I've never worked at a startup where you can personally chose the staff..

I've noticed people at startups tend to be developers focused on the latest trends, coding fast, the latest js framework etc, less focus on writing clear maitainable code.

Developers at larger companies focus on writing maintainable code, SOLID, TDD etc, less focus on the latest js framework.

What do you want?

I'm a big startup advocate, and for roughly GolfyMcG's reasons.

But all things depend on the individual companies, in some startups you won't get to hire. And for my luck, of the 2 large companies where I worked there was no chance of flex-time, or remote - or any kind of non- 9-5 schedule even for devs. On the other hand at 1 of them everyone left at 5 on the dot cause no one cared about their jobs - and a strict 40 a week feels like vacation a lot.

I think regardless of where you go you have to pick wisely (and I only picked large because my options where limited and the salaries where good.).

But as a rule small - not just startup, means you have more power and control over yourself and your fiefdom. And that freedom is what you like that's where you should go. (Or research - there's a lot more paperwork with research teams, but there's a lot of freedom as well.)

And yes - if you like writing good code you are proud of years later a big co is good place to do it. At my government gig, we wrote prototypes we'd knew would have to be thrown away, perfectly - because really why not? There were no hard to meet deadlines, or particular concerns about the grants running out. So we built things we'd be proud of, every time.

In my experience startups are not that much about freedom. They are often dominated by autocratic personalities, and short deadlines.

Startups are great experience. If you are lucky enough to be a technical co-founder then you get to pick the platform, design the system and generally call all the shots on the tech side. That alone can be quite rewarding. I'd say that was the most compelling reason for me personally.

There are a whole litany of standard answers to that question such as greater risk = great reward potential, the ability to choose and work on something you are truly interested in and/or passionate about.

I feel like the reasons are somewhat obvious as most HN'ers are aware of the pros/cons of this choice though I encourage others to chime in, I'm sure I'm forgetting a bunch.

I've never worked for a start-up in a development role before, but I think I would like it. I am 28, fresh out of grad school and working for a bank currently. I like my coworkers and the work but when I walk by management and I overhear "We're not a development shop," I get disheartened because banks are becoming data centers and have to be in the software game.

Take a look at...

Dwolla: they are out to destroy the Automated Clearing House industry. Bitcoin: banks need to know how to interface with that! Micropayments: same deal. Mobile: OCR for check deposits! Data science/analytics ("big data"): obvious.

Banks that fail to adopt a hacker culture because IT is a "cost center" (despite the fact that all operational units of any business are) will crumble.

Is your background more tech or more finance?

Not to discredit your question which is important in context... I feel like Both of them overlap and there are some really, really interesting problems in finance which most people don't have the balls to solve. There's a reason fintech startups are few and far between in comparison to the rest.

I was asking because I used to work in a bank, participated in two fintech startups, and have returned to banking due to circumstances with my family. I was going to target my advice based on the answer; however, after thinking this over some more, my advice would be the same for either answer. Stay in banking. There are a lot of problems in banking that need to be solved, and I think being on the inside of the bank gives one the best chance at solving those problems.

Tech definitely.

I left an agency job for a startup and got ~double the pay. Also, the work is WAY more rewarding. I don't even feel the need to work on side projects at home every night anymore...

I think the startup/established company debate boils down to personal taste, but I do prefer startups for the control you get over your future. My experience with start ups (at least in their growth phase) was that there was no need to switch positions or leave the company to grow professional, you just grow with the company.

Benefit of a startup (depending on the stage) --

You get to be involved more broadly, but you will also be working way more. You will learn a lot.

Downside of a startup -- you are putting a lot of personal time in for others benefit. Unless you are a Facebook/twitter/google/etc. (all based on luck) an early engineer at a startup is basically wasting away 25-50k/year (depending on level) he could be getting at a public company.

I've played the odds, out of about six or seven startups I worked at, one managed to pay out for the previous couple of years of work (and I am was back at market salary).

I love startups. I work with some now in my current role, I've consulted with many others over the years, but if your goal is pay for time, they are the wrong place to go.

One more potential battle story -- discussions for non-founding CTO of a seed stage startup. The personal sacrifice at the time to accept would have been about $70k/year in guaranteed money for sub 10% equity in the company and a ramp from 45ish hours to 60+hours/week. On paper from everything you can find via glassdoor/angels list/hackernews, the numbers were right regarding the offer. However, what needed to be built (in terms of the service) consulting for the same type of gig would have been $150+/hr and probably much safer/lucrative -- but wasn't an option.

Despite adoring the lead angel investor, I passed. I have my own projects going on and battle scars that kick in when I go back to thinking about being an early stage in building out other's startups on salary.

Aside from all the other (very good) answers regarding technical and corporate culture, the potential for a windfall--either monetary or career--is higher than in a company that either already has or likely never will go public or otherwise exit.

I say career because even if you don't make a lot of money, being an early technical member of a successful startup usually A) gives you a fair amount of visibility and credibility in the tech community and B) leads to a number of other job opportunities with startups with more responsibility and/or equity. Being able to execute under pressure is a valuable quality, and once founders or even VC firms know you can do it they start cherry-picking you.

Edit: should also add, don't go working for a startup just to go make money off equity. The grand majority won't make you much unless you're a very early hire; you'll probably make more over the same amount of time by investing your higher salary, ESPP, etc. at a more established company. Make sure the other factors are the "real" reason, with potential cash being a secondary one.

But I mention it because you ask why other people do it, and that's one reason why.

There's a lot of appeal in ownership of large parts of a product, building something from the ground up, lots of green-field development, fun chances to fiddle with new things, and of course lots of equity in something (you want to make) great.

"Startups" is a very broad brush. But I'd say that creating your own startup is almost always a valuable experience, wheras working for one is often a waste of potential earnings and time.

Leverage.

Everything you do is magnified, good and bad.

The advantage is learning curve. If you're in the right startup, you'll learning faster than you will anywhere else.

Risk vs reward. When you are young, it makes a lot of sense to take risky ventures with potentially huge payoffs, as you tend to have less responsibilities. As you get older, you tend to become naturally more risk averse, and look for more reliable income streams to keep your responsibilities filled.

Make sure that risk, is balanced with a potential reward though. To many young people think just because a startup sells, your going to end with some of that cash.

Most likely your not going to end up with any of that cash, unless you get into the right position first.

There are a wide range of stages for startups. Many post-series A startups pay very competitively in SF (~120-200k). Early stage startups won't usually pay as well or offer as great benefits, so your main draw for working there would be if you really believe in the product and want the equity.

In theory, equity in a startup. In practice ego and the slim possibility to grow with an organization.

Basically, it’s extremely unlikely for a junior developer to be chosen to manage people, unless they happen to be the most senior person there.

+1 on the startup idea. I left a big company to go to a startup and I think its really been a great choice. You'll be exposed to so many new ideas and technologies and really get a chance to expand your skillset. Maybe if you work at a big company like Google or Facebook you get exposed to more -- I don't know -- but where I came from it was night and day difference. For me, the people and experiences outweigh the slight difference in salary (which is still great all things considered).

Sorry you got let go, that sounds like a really unpleasant experience.

> You'll be exposed to so many new ideas and technologies and really get a chance to expand your skillset.

This will vary greatly by person and by company. For me it was the reverse - I went from a very small non-profit where I was the only developer to a large tech company and my skillset has expanded more in the ~6 months I've been here than in the 2.5 years I was at the non-profit.

Sure. I think this is a good point. I suppose when I was thinking startup I was envisioning a group of more than 1 developer. At least a 3-4.

The OP says they are engaged - depending on the situation this may mean the increased risk of a startup is not a great choice.

Or a great time since you can decrease risk with another income?

If you look at LinkedIn profiles of developers and designers a fair majority don't last long and go from one job to another every few months, to a year to two years.

This has been my experience too due to contract jobs, not getting along/connecting with the web agency owners (office politics) and having unrealistic demand thrust on me. Such demands being ok in 20 hours we need you to design, code, make it responsive, skin it into WordPress, configure widgets & create custom post types for a 20 to 30 page website. For, me that's not realistic, unless I'm working 12 to 16 hours a day and only putting down 4 hours a day.

My most enjoyable experiences in this field have been working at large companies (projects are not rushed due to a bureaucracy & people there are older/more mature) vs. at web agencies (get things done fast or your out and I'm king crap here I'll get rid of you whenever I feel like it).