

Ask HN: Should I become a partner at a new VC seed fund? - fourspace

TL;DR - I'm a senior level engineer and UX designer. Been offered a partnership at a new VC seed fund, but compensation is low due to their fund size and age.
--<p>Here's my situation: early thirties, CS major, worked full time while getting straight A's in full time undergrad at a B-level school. Since then, 13 years of experience with extremely large scale internet companies, the most recent 5 were at Google. Primarily focused on writing backend code and doing front end design for internal tools that deploy/manage large scale infrastructures (devops type stuff). I'm one of those supposedly hard to find designer/hacker hybrids.<p>Since living in the corporate world, I've been doing full stack dev consulting over the last year. I also have experience with two startups, one failed and one ongoing. Usually brought on as a CTO / engineering lead type role; being a reasonably skilled UI/UX designer doesn't hurt.<p>The older I get, the less interested I am in tinkering with technology and the more interested I get in solving human problems. In my view, good design is all about improving peoples' lives and good businesses do so by building things that real people value. Building well made, purposeful things is what stokes my fire, whether it's a web app or a company. Solving big problems certainly helps. Working with great people is even better. I love people.<p>Over the past few months an opportunity has presented itself for me to become a partner at a new early stage VC fund. They're interested in me for my technical expertise and résumé as well as my management experience, "people skills" and reputation in my community for being a vocal startup advocate (this is outside of SF). This firm has raised somewhere in the low 8-digits for their first fund. More funds may be raised in the future.<p>The offer is salary/bonus + carry equity + benefits. The salary is significantly lower than what I'd earn as a consultant, but the low number is primarily a result of the low administrative fees for a new fund. As the firm grows, presumably my compensation would grow with it. Obviously the more good deals I help source or vet, the better chances of success.<p>My dilemma is partly about money, but mostly about the major career shift. Being a VC is not like starting a startup; it's more a finance job than an engineering one. That said, the two new YC hires are evidence of a trend I'm seeing of good engineers becoming VCs, having technical knowledge on staff instead of just MBAs and former execs. I'm just worried that I'm making a switch away from engineering and in doing so will let my skills atrophy to where they're no longer marketable.<p>HN, what say you? Should I go to the dark side?
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kls
Here would be my concern, if they cannot match compensation, then they may not
have the resources to be in the VC market. I do not know your compensation but
I am going to assume somewhere south of 200k. If that is the case and there is
truly 8 digits of investment equity then there should be no issue with
carrying that kind of administrative burden. Now I know that those funds are
separated from operational funds, but in a VC firm we are usually talking
about a small amount of investors that enter the fund together, to claim that
the funding is not there and cannot be obtained, to fairly compensate you
would be a little disingenuous. I am not implying that they did, but if they
do, I would question it in my mind. Keep in mind that it will be years before
a first venture is liquidated for any return, so you could be at that
compensation level for the better part of a decade with no bonus due to no
equity positions being liquidated. While it has the potential to make you
rich, you will also take a hit for a long time with no guarantee that any
venture will ever pay off. I walked from a similar offer several years ago
after an exit and for me personally if I where in your shoes I would walk to.
If I had taken the offer I had I would still be waiting on the big hit as the
group that made the offer to me, is now in the first stages of exiting some
relatively small investments. The offer that was extended to me was around the
2002 mark so I would have waited 9 years for any payout.

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warehouse
Have you got confirmation that as the firm grows so does your compensation?
Also seeing they have raised 8 figures then, they should easily be able to pay
you 150k + equity + bonuses, if they are not able to do this I would be
concerned and would be concerned as they aren't able to compensate you
properly.

Also note, that your investments won't immediately make any return so that is
another thing to consider especially in terms of the fact that you will be on
a lower salary initally and will have to "wait" to see the outcome of your
investments in terms of making your % back.

Additionally, I don't think a shift in career would make your less marketable
if anything it will increase it because, should the firm "fail" then you have
learnt expertise to bring back into the marketplace as a consultant looking
from more of a financial background to assess whether adding X feature is good
in terms of value to the company or anyone - sure you can A/B test this stuff
but you can get a quick understanding by having both sets of skills.

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findm
Although I can't speak from experience, as long as the upfront pay is
acceptable enough I would jump on it. But what kls said, makes a good point.
FWIW I found the diversity of jobs I have taken have always lead me to a path
that I would not have imagined years earlier.

BTW I'm UX designer with similar background and I'm looking for some opinions
and guidance on my career. Would you be willing to chat with me?

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fourspace
Sure. Email me; my email is on my consulting company's site (see my profile).

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brudgers
> _"I love people."_

Do you love the people you would be working for?

