The big players have drastically pushed up developer comp. The "maybe" money that might come from a best-case startup exit isn't holding up well against the RSUs of the big players. I have friends pushing total comp north of 400K / year at the usual suspect companies. Over a five-year-span-till-liquidity your "maybe" money is competing against a near-guaranteed $2M in comp.
Equity grants for early hires haven't kept up well with both the afore mentioned industry comp pressure and the drastically increased time till liquidity. An early hire employee will be in the soup nearly as long as the founders but with significantly less upside.
That said, working at a startup can be great fun. It's also a fine opportunity to learn on somebody else's dime.
The big players have drastically pushed up developer comp. The "maybe" money that might come from a best-case startup exit isn't holding up well against the RSUs of the big players. I have friends pushing total comp north of 400K / year at the usual suspect companies. Over a five-year-span-till-liquidity your "maybe" money is competing against a near-guaranteed $2M in comp.
Equity grants for early hires haven't kept up well with both the afore mentioned industry comp pressure and the drastically increased time till liquidity. An early hire employee will be in the soup nearly as long as the founders but with significantly less upside.
That said, working at a startup can be great fun. It's also a fine opportunity to learn on somebody else's dime.