Lessons I Learned from Co-Founding a Tech Startup
blog.sueraisty.com
blog.sueraisty.com
You only get to compress your working life if your startup actually finds legs, and manages to find a lucrative exit, and you didn't get screwed on the cap table. Unless it does, you're working awful hard for what's effectively a lottery ticket.
Some people really really really need to work really really really hard. These people would be well-served to do some self-inquiry as to why they need to do this rather than try to find the right vehicle for their efforts, because that kind of effort is rarely rewarded, no matter what vehicle you put it in.
How is that not compressing your career into a few short years? Most people start working at about 20 and retire at about 65. That's 45 years of a career.
A decade sounds like "a few short years" compared to four or five decades if you ask me.
It says 4 in there, that's the figure Vince will probably be referring to.
4 years is missing a few of your kid's birthdays. 10 is missing most of them.
Or if you're in your 20s, 4 years is missing out on some great life experiences in your prime. 10 is missing out on all of them.
That depends on what depresses you more, poverty or responsibility.
There is a bias in startup world towards young ( early 20's) founders. Though it looks unfavourable towards the rest (in 30's and more), it seems more humanly justifiable. Guys in the former age group could easily squeeze in 5 to 7 years of life and still do a career/life reboot if things don't work out. But, if you are in 30's with family/kids, it becomes a lot more tragic and difficult( or even worse if you did'nt even get to start a family and missed life).
But even then, there are people who have ventured and found success against all odds. There is something about human will/courage/tenacity which is difficult to quantify and applied generically to people. Everyone needs to decide for themselves.
Maybe someday we'll get to the point where we realize that it's economically better for everyone to have single-payer health insurance in this country.
Edit: I've only seen what it costs for me personally, a single engineer in my 30's and a non-smoker. It's around $200/month for the catastrophic coverage. I vaugely recall paying around $65/month in my 20's pre-ACA. I know there's a hockey stick, though, so I expect 2 adults in their 50's with 4 children would add up. Again, this is for an HSA high-deductible plan.
10X is a bit of an exaggeration, it's more like 4X. about 250 for a young single person up to over 1000 for a family.
As a fiftysomething high-cost employee, I am aware of this in negotiation. May be illegal or immoral, but I can't blame potential employers for factoring this into the equation.
But, I feel I am under used and under paid. The things they want me to do is too easy. My working life is easy for me, and I want to do battle. So, I am training myself with by finishing on 2-3 Coursea classes per year (math, ML, SNA,..), attending workshops and Meetups in the valley. I worked 10-12 per day for many years now.
It works, I have fair knowledge on new areas and hands on development skill now. I get average 2-3 Linkedin head hunter requests per month for link or discussion job opportunities. I turned most of them down, because some of them too narrow scoped and I also do not want to embarrass myself: I gave my links/phone number to some, but they never call me back.
I will be 69 years old in few months. It took me a little efforts to get here.
No problem, I will create my own battle ground. I am not done yet.
But thank you for the numbers. An extra 9K a year doesn't really sound that much to pay for experience but I guess penny pinching is the order of the day for too many managers.
I think with the ACA, some small business can claim a tax credit for providing health insurance to their employees, but I'm not 100% sure about that part.
Compare this to a individuals wanting health insurance - if they're young and healthy they're less likely to want to pay much for insurance, which leaves older and sicker people to pay higher and higher premiums. Of course this is really only an issue with privatized insurance and is a great argument for having a single-payer solution.
That's NOT what adverse selection is. That's simply actuarial pricing - everyone pays for their own risk.
Adverse selection is caused by information disadvantage - the party buying insurance has information the insurance company does not have or is unable to incorporate into the price. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adverse_selection
The main cause for adverse selection in health insurance markets are regulations against pricing in various forms of pre-existing conditions.
It's absolutely an adverse selection problem - insurance companies, as you say, can't necessarily price based on your existing health condition (not only because of regulations, but also because of asymmetrical information which is too costly, if not impossible to obtain).
As a result, healthy people will choose not to purchase health insurance, since due to the adverse selection problem, there doesn't exist a mutually beneficial transaction for both parties (insurance policies have to price for the average due to the lack of health data, which is economically disadvantageous for the healthy to take). And thus begins the adverse selection death spiral[1]
Initially, it wasn't obvious this was a legal tax loophole, but the law was amended to explicitly allow it.
Now it's very hard to change, because getting health insurance from your employer makes you tied to your job. Even with the new health insurance exchanges, getting insurance through your employer is a pre-tax benefit, but if you buy on your own, it's with after-tax money.
And...? What happened? Such a cliffhanger!
Also, negotiate the sh&t out of your bills. Think of bills from your lawyer/firm as an opening offer. Only suckers pay what is put in front of them. Any savvy client gets hours written off.
Also, avoid future hassles with co-founders by setting the terms early and often. A simple LLC will clearly delineate who gets what and protect everyone from liability extending beyond the company's own holdings. If you feel like you can't afford an attorney at this juncture, a LOT of law schools offer free services and will gladly do the contract work for you. And when you get that letter of intent or first inkling of an offer, get a lawyer ASAP. They will help you get the best terms in the most tax-efficient manner possible.
Sad but I can see this happening..
"No matter how dreamy the startup, it is not worth sacrificing your health."
I just wish more bosses of start ups felt this way about their employees! But I suppose that's because they have much more to gain and not much to lose from making their employees work more than they should.
It does feel strange to be talked down to when dressed professionally, yet talked to like you understand what's going on when you show up in Vans and a hoodie, indeed.
Logically speaking, if everyone dresses down, that includes women as well. Kickass male "code warriors" aren't stereotypically known for their sharp grooming habits either.
I've seen that one happen, and I had a lesser version of it happen to me because I dress east coast prep. I started wearing sloppier clothes for some outside meetings and got treated better. Even inside the company, it took new hires a while before they realized that I have skills.
SV culture on appearance is every bit as stupid as the culture of the dinosaurs, it's just flip-flopped. Instead of 'you must dress professionally', it's 'you must wear unflattering hoodies, t-shirts, and jeans.'
The lesson is simple. It is that you know nothing, and nobody else does either.
On the note of cofounders... I can't understand why more people don't end up in business with childhood friends. Met my cofounder aged 12. Started our first business at 13. Then 14, 15, 16... Then 22 - and that one stuck - 31 now, both in years and headcount. Trust isn't something we even think about. It just is.
It doesn't make starting a company from scratch easier, but it does mean that (a) there are few "hard conversations" that can compare to the ones we've already had at some point, (b) trust is implicit, and (c) we can communicate very efficiently and effectively.
If founding is like marriage, then marry your best friend.
Old MSFT trick from Comdex/Windows World days. Everybody was always standing at their cubes because they used double pads under the carpet.