
Ask HN: Toxic startup enviroment, need advice - thrwawayaftruse
2.5yrs ago I started working for this startup. Not my first so I am cognizant about the risks and what it takes out of you. Few months after I started a licensing deal fell through so I volunteered to take a pay cut with the understanding we were going to go all out until profitability. We went all out, but the founders(Fs) didn&#x27;t do any sales or marketing for 9 months, so yeah. Then they promised things were changing and they would really step it up in. 6 months later, we are growing pitifully &amp; the story is the same. After seeing Fs make the same mistakes every 6 months, I decided to leave. As a core dev is hard to replace in 2 weeks, I gave them 4 months of notice. They didn&#x27;t hire anyone. So, I gave them 4 more months. Yup. But I really wanted to do right by them :(  During this, I was validating startup ideas. I moved forward with one and, when pressed about my plans, told Fs. A week later, in a 4 hour meeting, they tried to convince me to build it for them saying they can sell and market it. I refused. A week later, they offered cofounder role. I declined. Now, they want to pursue it and claim it was their idea the whole time, that &quot;the lawyers would have to decide&quot; whether non-compete would apply. I&#x27;m not worried about competition. Rather, I feel extremely betrayed. After trusting them &amp; sweating blood for them, they pull this shit. And, the prospect of a possible lawsuit isn&#x27;t great. I don&#x27;t want to rage quit this week as a) I told them Dec, b) savings: additional money is nice, not a requirement. But, I am not sure I can stick it till Dec and if that would just strengthen their non-compete argument.<p>1. Airing dirty laundry is not good, but the idea Fs are going scot-free with such despicable behavior gnaws at me. Should I name and shame them? FWIW other employees are willing to back me up.<p>2. Should I quit asap and not honor what I told them? Would that be stooping to their level or just what they deserve?<p>3. Why must people be dicks?
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reality_czech
You're an employee. 2 weeks notice is all you need to give. You already gave
that, so move on.

Why would you stay at a place that you didn't like for 4 months? That was
silly. So was telling them your business ideas. Honestly, you've got nobody to
blame but yourself here.

Non-competes aren't even valid in California so just move there and start your
social network for dogs.

~~~
thrwawayaftruse
Social network for dogs. Crap. How did you _KNOW_??

:)

Thanks for taking the time to comment.

I am loyal and think taking a few months out to help people transition isn't
that big a deal.

But really, it's a trait I have that makes me a good employee, but also opens
me up to this sort of exploitation.

Live and learn.

~~~
daltonlp
Read this, and re-read it a couple times a year:

[http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2014/07/13/how-the-
other...](http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2014/07/13/how-the-other-half-
works-an-adventure-in-the-low-status-of-software-engineers/)

~~~
reality_czech
Mike O. can be entertaining, but he needs to stop taking himself so seriously.

Ironically, using a sample size of 2 companies to make sweeping
generalizations about "the social status of software engineers" indicates the
author is not cut out for data science. Anyone who would rely on anecdotes and
tiny sample sizes to draw such strong conclusions should stay away from
statistics.

------
onedev
Quit ASAP. You owe them nothing. I am telling you right now, whatever justice
you are trying to achieve by "standing by your word", you will not achieve it
and they will still fuck you over. DO NOT under any circumstances waste more
of your time. Let me rephrase. Do not waste any of your LIFE on this
situation. It's not worth it.

Here is what you should do starting right now.

1\. Document everything that you still can. Emails, conversations, records.
Get everything and put it into a folder. You will need this in case something
comes up later.

2\. Quit tomorrow.

3\. Go pursue your startup idea. If you need more savings and want to build
some up, do some freelance projects which I'm sure others on here would be
happy to point you towards. You already said additional money is not a
requirement so there should be nothing stopping you from wasting your time.

Again, you owe them nothing.

~~~
thrwawayaftruse
I love checklists :

1\. On it. I've gotten emails forwarded to my personal account and d no
personal projects on work laptops or time. Atleast I've got that going for me.

2\. :( Can't pull that off right now.

3\. I hadn't thought of this. Or rather, had discounted it because it would
lead to a lack of focus. However, too many people have now suggested this for
me to ignore. Thanks :)

~~~
S4M
> 2\. :( Can't pull that off right now.

Why can't you quit? You already gave your notice. If they are not trying to
replace you, that's their problem, not yours. If you are short of money, can
you get another job first, do some saving and pursue your idea on the side?

~~~
thrwawayaftruse
Thanks for taking the time to comment.

I've thought a lot about this since I posted this question. At the end of the
day, I've given them notice till X. So, it doesn't sit right by me to not
honor that :(

Yeah, it's naive, but I think getting out of this mess without devolving to
their level means something to me.

~~~
onedev
This attitude is what got you into the mess in the first place. If you're not
going to take the first step in trying to better yourself for your _own_ good,
then I have no faith in you.

If you're going to start a company, you're going to have to make hard
decisions and have conviction. If you can't do even this when it's quite clear
that it's negatively affecting you, then please don't start a company and just
find another job.

------
kpatrick
After you quit, you can absolutely compete with them. The only issue around
"owning the idea" is with regards to patents. Having personally gone through
this, it is hard (perhaps impossible) for them to claim patent assignment on a
patentable idea that hasn't already been filed with the patent office before
your end date. Once you leave the company, preparing the patent application
would be work which you can not be forced to do. They also can't file since
they weren't the inventors.

------
craigching
> when pressed about my plans, told Fs

There's your mistake. It's one thing to keep your ideas separate from your
work (there are contracts that insist that any idea you have belongs to who
you work for), but it's another to tell your company about your ideas. As soon
as you tell them, they can make an argument about who owns the idea.

That said, they sound pretty incompetent. If you're serious about your idea,
you probably need a lawyer at this point. If not, cut your losses, be done
with them, and move on. I can't actually give you advice on your idea, it
might be good to let that go as well if you want to avoid future legal
problems. If you think it's worth fighting for, get a lawyer.

In the future, keep your ideas separate from your work if you're
entrepreneurial. By that I mean only work on them in your own time on your own
equipment, including your smart phone.

~~~
joeclark77
Somehow I doubt that these guys have the drive and sticktuitiveness to go
after the OP in court. Seems that they're either too shy or too lazy to even
talk to potential customers, much less fight you in court for another idea
that they wouldn't follow through on anyway.

OP should probably take sensible precautions like saving all his e-mails (off
of company machines!) and staying on friendly terms with other employees who
might one day be called as witnesses. But I wouldn't recommend "ragequitting",
just go politely.

~~~
thrwawayaftruse
Yup. I am not worried about being out-executed by them. Things would be a lot
different if I respected their execution enough to be afraid of it :)

I've been meticulous about saving emails and am on great terms with the other
employees.

As you recommend, I'm swallowing my bile and quitting politely, but firmly.

Thanks for taking the time to comment. It's unanimous: I've been stupid and
the only thing to do now is damage control and move on with life :)

~~~
joeclark77
I don't think you've been stupid. You were patient and gave some of your time
to support someone else. If nobody did that, or if we called people "stupid"
for doing that, we'd be living in a pretty lousy world. In this case it didn't
work out for you, but next time maybe it will. I hope you don't adapt to this
experience by becoming a trust-no-one paranoid.

~~~
thrwawayaftruse
Hi Joe,

Thanks for taking the time to reply. I understand what you mean. While I'm
going to still be loyal until given reason not to, the main thing this
experience has taught me is that you can't wait too long for other people to
help themselves.

Sometimes being loyal/being there is just enabling. I guess the art is in
figuring out when you are supporting vs enabling :)

------
britknight
First of all, don't worry about them stealing _your_ idea when they can't even
get their own off the ground.

Secondly, if your working relationship with the founders is "let the lawyers
decide" you don't owe them anything, much less any more time out of your life.

Thirdly, staying on longer would give them room to maneuver you into a bad
legal position with respect to the non-compete clause. If you give final
notice of leaving and the next day the company unexpectedly pivots to your
idea, you're left in a bit of a jam. Sooner might well be better than later in
this case.

What you decide to do is ultimately up to you. But be wary of being
manipulated into _another_ 4 month notice period, and _another_ , and
_another_. Your time is the most important resource you have (up there with
your health); be wary of wasting it.

~~~
thrwawayaftruse
Makes sense. And, thats what I've been telling myself. My SO is very adamant
on #2 and has been pushing me to leave. I guess my sense of miss-guided "do
the right thing" attitude is fucking me over.

Since I posted the question I took time to evaluate the situation and came to
pretty much your conclusions :) So, I've bought a plane ticket for a week long
vacation in October and I plan to have quit by then.

Thanks for taking the time to comment.

------
seanrrwilkins
I've made the "loyalty" mistake before too. I stayed too long at one company,
quit and then came back out of some sense of loyalty to the clients and my
team. In the end, I would have been better off leaving as soon as I new it was
going sour.

My recommendation:

1\. Leave now. Give them two week as a final notice and leave.

2\. Reach out to your personal and professional network with a clear ask for
some freelance introductions to hold you over for a few months.

3\. Put the rest of your time into you own idea and build it.

4\. Don't worry about non-competes. They're nearly impossible to enforce, and
it sounds like these guys won't have the stones to support any kind of legal
fight past a stern letter from a cheap lawyer.

