
Ask HN: How much did you earn as an employee from an exit? - twidlit
If you joined a startup before as an employee, how much did you earn out when it exited?
======
mr_throwaway
I joined as their 3rd employee - as a junior developer to assist the current
senior. When they saw how good I was, they sacked the senior. I was given a
pay _cut_ , ostensibly to keep the lights on, prettied-up with a new contact
saying if after a year they were still in business I'd get my salary restored,
but a major bonus if they reach profitability or were bought out within a
year. Cue 12 months of being an idiot, regularly working weekends and all-
nighters to add major features on little notice for meetings with potential
customers and developers. New projects were piled on with no regard for
workload or realistic deadlines. They needed a new DC, but rather than hire a
sysadmin they passed it to me because I'd had experience on my CV.

By this point I'd lost sight of salary and bonus - I was working to try to
avoid letting the team down by missing deadlines. As absurd as it sounds now,
the atmosphere in the office made me feel I was part of something special, I
was doing my part, and I was going to anything I could to keep up my part. I'd
been hired part-time, but I worked full time, and then some, spurred on by my
mis-placed sense of loyalty and necessity to cope with my workload. Then at
the end of the year they said they couldn't afford to give me back the pay
cut, and a couple of months later they announced they were going to be
acquired - conveniently close to the year end to be a coincidence. I realised
that I wasn't part of the team, I was just employee 3. I'd already started to
suffer major burn-out / a bit of a breakdown, so I quit. That was years ago
and I'm only just starting to get myself back together.

I blame myself entirely - I was naive and let myself be manipulated and used.
By that point I was so deep into the "we're all in this together" that I
couldn't see what was happening. But you're not in it together - there may be
more honorable founders out there, but at the end of the day, you're working
to line their pockets, and just because you've got a bit of paper saying
they'll be nice doesn't mean they will. Trust no-one, get everything you're
owed up front, and remember at all times that for you it's just a job.

Work to live, don't live to work.

(From a throwaway account for obvious reasons. Ahh, that's better ;) )

~~~
smokestack
> Work to live, don't live to work.

Noone's allowed to believe this in the startup world ;)

~~~
skcin7
+1 sir.

Should be revised to "Work to live, don't live to work. (unless it's your own
startup)" :)

Perhaps his thread can also be good lesson for those trying to run a startup,
to treat your employees fairly and don't take advantage of them (no matter if
they are a programmer or not)

------
angryasian
1st time I was naive didn't get all the details and ended up getting screwed,
was also a really good exit. was hired as first engineer.

2nd time was a little more than a quarterly bonus at last corporate job, so
yeah wasn't much. was 2nd engineer hired.

I know its anti karma saying this but working at startups suck.

edit- I see people putting 18 / 20k and is probably good depending on what
area you live in but for perspective my last quarter bonus was 10k.

~~~
lamby
> 1st time I was naive didn't get all the details and ended up getting screwed

What details is one meant to know?

~~~
nikcub
\+ number of shares outstanding

\+ who gets diluted

\+ vesting schedule

\+ does vesting accelerate with an acquisition?

\+ liquidation preferences

\+ how large is the employee option pool

\+ what happens to your holding on a down-round or restructure (this is hard
not to get screwed on if this is the intention)

\+ not checking that the options agreement has been signed by the company

\+ not signing an options agreement and taking the company and/or founder at
their word that you have stock

founders usually give themselves a sweet deal. ask to see their agreement and
compare it to yours.

while you are at it, check the structure of the board and if the board are
able to block an acquisition. you may be working for a company who can't exit
unless the investors get at least 4-5x, and if they don't, you get nothing

there are probably some things that I am missing, which is why it is worth
paying a lawyer for 3-4 hours of time to go over it (not the company lawyer -
see 'the social network')

~~~
enjo
Liquidation preferences (in particular) are a big deal. It's entirely possible
(if not common) for you to purchase stock that is literally worthless. In
small and even mid-size exits certain employees simply won't get paid.

~~~
Retric
That' probably the best advice possible. If your employee number 3 and they
want to to take a payout etc get 'liquidation preference 'on any lost income *
risk + interest or work for someone else. If your employee #10 and they still
want a significant pay-cut work for someone else.

PS: The law is on your side, as an employee lost pay is paid out before any
other creditor but you need to list actual salary in $ and not just shares.
You also can have issues with taxes so be careful.

------
patio11
Just like YC is equalizing informational asymmetry between twenty-something
founders and people with signatory authority on hundreds of millions, I'm
really glad that HN contributes to education of prospective employees like
this.

I like to think I'm smart. Two years ago, prior to HNducation, many common-as-
dirt features of cap tables like e.g. liquidation preferences would have been
a totally successful ambush on me. (If you can't explain three ways why 2% of
$40 million is zero, consider carefully whether your best interests are being
represented in a negotiation with someone who can.)

~~~
japhyr
How is 2% of $40 million zero?

~~~
patio11
Three options:

1) Liquidation preferences.

2) "We wipe out common stock at acquisition and offer employees retention
bonuses, leaving 2% owner who moved on totally shafted."

3) Pretend your corporate charter is a Ruby program and a malicious adversary
gets write access to it. Seriously, the sky's the limit. Integers might be
kitten pictures now, and multiplication returns shades of pink.

~~~
throwaway96
1) Liquidation preferences: Right, and part of the problem is that as more
investments are collected, more preferred shares get in line ahead of
employees' common shares. "Down" rounds tend to devastate the value of common
shares.

But the good news is that upper management and regular employees are in
principle affected the same way by these vicissitudes, and in practice I've
seen that mostly happen. Some exceptions include founders/upper-management
getting special opportunities to cash out or receiving significant anti-
dilutive share bonuses. I'm not saying that the founders and employees have
exactly the same incentives here, but they are at least somewhat helpfully
aligned.

2) Agree that I've heard gossip about these kinds of scenarios, but (I've
often wondered) wouldn't this be a violation of their fiduciary duty to
certain stockholders? Can a lawyer weigh in on whether (in theory) this
scenario allows for a legal remedy?

3) True, the corporate charter is not a contract with an employee, and it can
be rewritten at will by the Board. But it seems to me there are limits: if
they edit the charter in a way that deliberately wipes out the value of your
shares and had a choice not to, this resembles case 2, where I suspect one can
seek legal redress (right?).

------
TWSS
So is no one naming names of the companies they worked for? Most of this stuff
doesn't seem to violate any NDAs and we're all past the quiet period...

Anyway, I was an early rank and file employee at a startup that was acquired
by WebMD. When WebMD merged with Healtheon in '99 - which I'm counting as an
exit, since our office was shut down shortly thereafter - we were able to
exercise our options. I cashed out a third of my vested ISOs to the tune of
about $50K. Not FU money, but a nice boost to a 25 year old, and enough to put
a substantial down payment on a house.

What I learned:

• Some of my coworkers thought I was loony for cashing out when I did - they
thought the stock price would keep going up. And it did - for a while.
Remember, this was 2000. We were all out of a job in six months. A bird in the
hand, etc.

• Some people cashed out 100%, seeing dollar signs, and didn't get counseled
on the tax ramifications. That ended poorly. These were young engineering
types who chose not to listen to our awesome CFO/office manager/HR person back
when we were a tiny startup. It's amazing how someone can grok Python, and not
compound interest.

• The house I put 25% down on in 2000 sold in 2006 for more than twice what I
paid for it, while the "nostalgia shares" I kept from WebMD aren't worth one-
tenth of what they were in 2000. This was a valuable lesson in the benefits of
diversification.

Finally, what I learned was that the only difference between gambling in Vegas
and gambling with tech startup stock options is that in Vegas, you get free
drinks.

~~~
Rantenki
Some startups have free drinks too, which generally means there is NO
difference from Vegas.

~~~
TWSS
Heh, good point, and fodder for another interesting post - how working at a
startup is like Vegas...

------
throwaway96
2nd developer, $1.4M in an IPO after 8 years. Took what I considered to be a
reduced (around 75%) salary for the first 3 years. The first 5 or so
developers probably all got something in the same range or more. The company
is not particularly famous; most on HN will not have heard of it.

I understand that the good outcome was partly due to years of draining work
and even more so due to very good luck.

Many developers are undervalued by employers, but shares can work out. It's
worth taking the time to learn what percentage stake you're getting (if you
ask and the employer doesn't tell you, walk away) and doing your own
assessment of the possibilities and risks for the company.

~~~
scumola
Tony?

~~~
throwaway96
No. Sorry about the throwaway account, but I wanted to mention that my
colleagues did well without allowing people to identify them.

------
kevinpet
I'm not sure if you would consider these "startups" per se, but I've been at
two private companies that had an acquisition or equivalent.

Large comparison shopping site, I joined about 9 months before a majority
stake was sold to a private equity group. They took a while to grant my
options and by that time they were in talks about the acquisition, so the
options were priced at the acquisition price (since once they'd seen an offer,
they couldn't price "fair market value" below that). I didn't exercise, since
at that price it wasn't going to perform better than any other stock and
wasn't liquid.

Next time around, I got eleventy billion options in a "startup" around series
G or H funding. They got acquired but did not cover the liquidation
preferences for investors, so no employees saw a dime. They did hand out some
pretty significant bonuses.

------
mjw
Once: nothing. (Except a mac mini which the founder was nice enough to buy me
as a kind of `exit bonus' :)

Despite my options having vested, investors held preferred stock which (since
the exit was small-ish) left no liquidity on the table for the employee
option-holders.

Then, because I was no longer working there at the time of the exit, nothing
was negotiated for me as part of the sale. (Those employees who did stay on
got something I think, not tonnes though AFAIK and they came with `golden
handcuffs').

I had worked hard for them at well below market on the basis the options would
make up for my opportunity cost. They didn't, despite the company getting an
exit.

My advice would be always treat options as a `nice to have' not a replacement
for salary, they're so hard to value effectively, and even in the event of an
exit their value can still depend to a great extent on the goodwill of
founders and investors at the time, on whether you're still working there and
whether you want to work for the acquirer, and in general on so many factors
outside your control.

~~~
mjw
(To clarify, I did have fun there and learn quite a bit; if you like the work,
you've got to take that into account too when considering opportunity costs vs
working at a bank etc. But my advice on options still stands.)

------
mattvanhorn
1st time, I was the first employee of a company that grew to over 150 people.
It went bust in the first dot-com bubble bursting and I got nothing for my
sizable number of options, except for a lesson in how easily CEOs can break
promises regarding money held in escrow.

2nd time, I was the first employee of a company that never got bigger than 15
people. I had 2%, with a quarter of that vested (0.5%) The company was
acquired and I got nothing except one week's notice that I might need a new
job and a lesson in liquidation preferences.

This time around I'm getting 25 basis points, and I'm employee number 50 or
so. We'll see if the third time is the charm, but to be honest, I truly don't
care. Equity is nice to have but it's worthless until it's not.

------
ojbyrne
So employees complain about options being worth squat.

And founders/managers complain about not being able to hire talent.

I believe that's referred to as a "market disconnect."

~~~
davedx
It's the same in the games industry:

Employees complain about burnout and being treated like slaves and many end up
leaving the sector never to return.

Owners & upper mgmt. do interviews on gamesindustry.biz bemoaning the lack of
talent and blaming the governments for insufficient education.

~~~
frou_dh
...and insisting they deserve tax-breaks (in the UK).

------
tptacek
1st, after a couple years work, non-founder, was mid-tens.

2nd, after a year and a half, non-founder, was "could have bought a house and
put kids through college if I wasn't young and stupid"-money.

3rd, founder, zero. Sucked up the money from 2nd, in fact; it was negative.

4th, employee, four years; would have been six figures had I bought my options
when I quit (but even after that, I'd still recommend being wary of buying
your options when you leave). But: you gotta put the four years you worked
there in the divisor, too.

5th is current company, and I'm a founder.

------
dlikhten
Wow from the sound of it all, sounds like staying at a wall st job with a
decent pay/bonus is better than joining a startup, except for the possibility
of working on something kick-ass.

~~~
sliverstorm
As I gather, start-ups have always been that way. Only people who really stand
a chance of making it big are the founders and the investors; as a regular-Joe
employee you make competitive compensation on a _good_ day, so you should
really be there because you like the work, not because you want big money.

~~~
twidlit
You work at a startup because you believe in the mission, want to have a
bigger impact, your co-workers rock and you want to KNOW how to start one
someday. The exit is the gamble for gravy.

~~~
rick888
1) Business owners will just take advantage of this (this thread is littered
with comments that show exactly this). You will get less pay and make them
rich.

I'm really sick of companies that think I will take a 30-50% pay cut for a
foosball table and Nerf-gun fights on Fridays.

2) You can gain valuable experience by starting your own company. There are
plenty of blogs, articles, and sites like HN that can help you along the way.

~~~
sliverstorm
_Don't_ take the 30-50% pay cut, use the money to buy your office a foosball
table, and go out and play laser tag on Fridays? If you need your officemates
to be there, pay their fees, and you'll probably still come out ahead.

------
pathik
Most employees at a startup often get screwed. I recently joined a startup and
I'm considering the value of my options to be zero. If they do pay off, it'll
be a bonus for me. Go for either the learning experience, or if you really
love working there. Chances are, if you aren't among the founders, you won't
see much even on a successful exit.

Tip: Do an early exercise (83b election) and convert your options into RSUs to
avoid higher taxation.

[http://www.startupcompanylawyer.com/2008/02/15/what-is-
an-83...](http://www.startupcompanylawyer.com/2008/02/15/what-is-
an-83b-election/)

~~~
stretchwithme
since 90% of startups fail, most employees and founders don't get a pay off.

~~~
adgar
This submission is about startups with a (presumably positive) exit. Despite
that restriction, removing the 90% you cite, many employees are still
expressing significant disappointed with their resulting compensation.

------
exithrowaway
I worked at a semiconductor startup that was acquired in the recession of 08.
Got 2 years of a 12.5k annual retention bonus, and well, my job (engineers
stayed on, sales/upper management were out)

Was it worth staying there for 2 more years? Dear god No. My opinion these
days is that "most post-m&a situations suck", especially those where you're
not immediately integrated into the acquiring's company culture, or promoted
to lead them to better things. The problem is that it's deceiving at first.
When you get acquired, you're like, "hey, my fellow engineering team stays the
same, and all the crappy management from startup is out!". They built a new
satellite office for us to move into with their other recent acquisitions.
While it sounds nice, it's miserable if you don't see a growth path for
yourself, and don't understand how the rest of the acquiring company
functions. Why should I work for some options of a company I don't understand?

In the 2+ years, I've dealt with lack of funding for projects I want to do
(project customers want and competitors already have), watched several very
smart engineers (the ones you look up to) leave the company, as well as my own
manager recently leave. Simultaneously, I feel like my work-life is more
stressful as I have to work with "company-wide" field engineers that don't
necessarily care about our product line, we've been losing customers since
they notice us not shipping new parts and integrating our support across the
company.

To help clarify, I'm an apps engineer - i.e. a mix of trying to do software
development, customer support, working/managing a contractor, setting up our
issue tracker, and dropping everything to hack something up for a tier-1
customer.

My advice to other non-founders getting acquired: If you're not in debt, don't
worry about the money from your acquisition. Worry about whether you'll be
gaining any new experiences post-acquisition. If the acquiring company is just
dangling you along, leave. Be very weary of "retention bonuses" - they can
alter the way you perceive your work for the worse.

Disclaimer: I need to start following the above advice.

~~~
copper
That sounds _very_ familiar for some reason.

I must say, though: I've never heard of anyone who was an employee at the last
n or so startups similar to yours who actually made money off their options
from an exit - though hopefully a certain large recent acquisition beats that
average :)

~~~
exithrowaway
eh, I blame our former management for not selling us before the recession. We
had some much acquisitions better offers come our way and they were too
thickheaded about the success of the market to take em.

------
assgobel
Hey quit ruining the Ponzi scheme for all us startup founders and investors!
If word gets out that the vast majority of tech startups go nowhere and even
in an acquisition the chumps...I mean employees... make shit, the game is up!

Then I won't be able to attract any underpaid, overworked slaves for my crappy
company!

I tell them that they'll learn about startups by sitting in their corner
writing code while I hang out with the investors. I tell them any old bullshit
about bonuses and vacations and the fools never ask for it in writing. Morons!

Haha, not to worry. Starry-eyed, "passionate" idiot nerds are born every
minute. HN is the best place to find them.

Carry on, gents! I'm laughing all the way to the bank.

~~~
Shengster
Not sure why he is getting downvoted as this is obvious satire, but this is
probably the case at some startups.

------
bugsy
Like many others here, the couple times I've been along from start to exit,
despite all the contracts and promises and hard work at low pay with no
overtime, key contributions, etc, so far, never a dollar, and in one case, a
protracted legal battle as they tried to steal my preexisting IP which I had a
signed agreement from them acknowledging belonging to me, signed before I
started work.

~~~
haasted
What kind of loophole in your signed agreement did they try to use to get hold
of your IP? Was there a problem with the contract, or were they simply hoping
you would cave in order to avoid a legal battle?

~~~
bugsy
I had things locked down great, as I had gone to work with them to implement
my IP that they required fundamentally as part of their business. They signed
a licensing agreement and a document outlining the various inventions I had
coming in to it. After their product was ready to ship, there was a buy out
offer, but required exclusive ownership of my IP. The license was non-
transferable and required renegotiation. They didn't like this and asked me to
transfer ownership outright to them for free or they would fire me and I would
lose all my equity. They had absolutely no case whatsoever, but this didn't
stop them from launching legal proceedings against me. These went no where
since it was only for the purpose of strongarming and intimidating me. At one
point, a vice president of the company was telephoning relatives of mine and
threatening them if I didn't cave. I didn't cave, held to my position (which
was very reasonable), and they didn't bother to proceed since they knew they
had no case, but only after tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees to top
notch lawyers to represent me against them. Several months after this they
sold to another company (Fortune 500 sort) and lied to them that they owned my
IP, not mentioning me at all. That company then patented it, with the VP
claiming to have invented it. At the same time I have his signature on a
licensing agreement, the exact text describing the invention which appears on
their new patent, granted some 10 years after I first implemented it. (It was
previously a trade secret that I was selectively licensing.) Of course the
next question is why don't I sue them. That's easy. At the end of all this I
was broke and in debt and there's no lawyer taking IP cases pro bono. They are
tremendously expensive and in the end the company with the deeper pockets
nearly always wins. Good IP lawyers run $400+ per hour.

------
m0nastic
When my current company (~200 employee startup) got acquired about 5 years ago
my internal stock was translated into about 20k.

We then had a 10k payout for staying an additional year.

Considering everyone assumed that our internal stock would never be worth
anything, I was fairly pleased overall.

------
realize
I'm surprised by how uniformly negative most people's experiences are. The
positive stories seem to be the exceptions.

~~~
rick888
It's not surprising to me at all. People seem to expect a large stake in a
company where they are just an employee..and then get frustrated and upset
when the owners take a buyout and they get canned.

~~~
gaius
Would you go work for IBM as just an employee for half your salary and double
your hours? No, then you shouldn't do that for _any_ company.

~~~
true_religion
Some people are choosing to do so because for them the experience is worth it.

It's like "working" by going to an apprenticeship. Your salary is lower, but
you learn a lot.

If you're going to start your own business in the near future, then it might
be worth it to work for a startup even if its a huge pay cut all things
considered.

~~~
gaius
Yes, _but that actually has to happen_.

If you are working 80 hrs/week churning out code to realize someone else's
"vision" who treats you like a slave not a partner, then what are you
learning? Apart from not to get suckered again.

~~~
true_religion
Yes, but that's subjective.

You have no idea if you're going to feel like a slave or a partner until
you've already taken the job.

\--

I'd say try it. Don't _assume_ that you will be dissatisfied based on
treatment you can't predict.

------
bane
1) 5%, and they kept their word. Unfortunately it turned out to be only around
$5k -- small ISP sold when the market was transitioning away from dial-up. But
I was young, and this was good money for me at the time.

2) 0% - the company performed poorly, and I needed cash, so when salaries were
cut, then cut again, then again, I bailed for the security of a bigCo.
Apparently its now a pretty successful division of a bigCo.

3) Currently awaiting an exit, at the prices we're currently talking about I
should see mid-six figures.

4) Still building (I'm at 3 & 4 simultaneously), co-founder of a bootstrap.

I've also worked at a couple bigCos in the meanwhile, but outside of some
profit sharing that goes into a retirement fund...it's just salary and
bonuses.

------
wpietri
One place to get this information is in SEC filings. Look, for example, at
Google's filing for the YouTube acquisition:

<http://www.secinfo.com/d14D5a.uM1t.htm#_rom20596_5>

With a little rummaging in LinkedIn you can figure out who started when.
Multiply the number of shares times $500 or so and you'll know what they ended
up with.

~~~
zackattack
Easy market: do lookups on silicon valley individual's estimated networth.
Creepy as hell, but inexpensive to engineer.

------
gyardley
A little late, but I'm adding this since there's not a ton of comments on here
on relatively-late employees.

The first time as an employee, I would've received mid-five-figures, if only
I'd been able to afford the $10K to exercise my options when I left. (Whoops.)
I was employee #150 or so.

The second time as an employee, low-five-figures from the options, and close
to $100K from a year's worth of retention bonus. Would've been more if I'd
stayed for three years instead of one. Here I was around employee #100.

In both cases the startups were already mature when I arrived - not guaranteed
to exit, but a stone rolling downhill. Whatever I made was gravy; I was paid
at or close to market rate at both places.

In my opinion, employees do best at startups that've already had some success.
Being the first employee is too close in risk to being a founder, but with
just a fraction of the rewards.

------
snewe
Here's an academic article on the pay for entrepreneurs backed by VCs:

<http://www.stanford.edu/~rehall/HallWoodward6.pdf>

High average returns driven by huge exits and most entrepreneurs earn 0.

------
mgarfias
I made something like US$18k (pretax). Was the downpayment on my house. Not as
much as I wished, but beats the hell out of flaming out.

ETA: Company sold out about 2 years after I started. I didn't make nearly as
much as if I had continued being a contractor with a BigDumbCo. But I had a
_LOT_ more fun.

------
sitkack
20k on a 30M purchase by a large company wanting to enter our space. I didn't
know shit about options. Pretty good for 9 months, nearly even with the salary
I should have had in a non-startup job. So in the end, deferred savings plan.

------
happyboredom
Beware of taxes! If you exercise at least 1 full year (366 days) before the
company sells you pay capital gains tax (currently 15%) instead of full income
tax (could be ~35%). I did not exercise my options early. Consequently, I
coughed up over one-third of my cash to Uncle Sam in the form of taxes &
withholding.

~~~
lrm242
Exercising options in a company with no market to sell those shares is a
recipe for bankruptcy. Exercising an option is a taxable event, regardless of
whether you sell the result shares to receive cash. If you try to anticipate
an exit by exercising options early to minimize tax, you might find yourself
with a hefty tax bill and no way to pay it should that exit not actually
materialize.

When dealing with stock options the best advice is, IMO, always to exercise
and immediate sell enough of the stock to cover the result tax hit.

------
anmol
I know of several MIT people who've been early employees at startups in their
20s / early 30s and made few hundred K upon exit.

Does that happen often? No.

Will it happen for early Dropbox and Airbnb employees? Yes.

Can you get the same options if you joined Dropbox today? No.

------
danshapiro
I think you're asking how much was earned on the day the deal closed - which
is a fine way to measure.

But it's worth keeping in mind that it's very common for employees,
particularly early/key employees, to have significant additional upside after
the deal closes: unvested shares, retention bonuses, etc.

~~~
andjones
can you provide any sources please?

------
rick888
I wouldn't work for a startup, unless the pay was higher than than market
(since there is more risk involved). I would also treat it as a job (IE: no
insane hours).

All too often, people toil away their life for someone else's idea and then
get kicked to the curb (it's happened to me a couple times too). If I'm going
to be wasting my free time working, it's going to be for the possibility of a
big payout..which will only happen if I own the company.

~~~
true_religion
Most people try to higher day 1 employees that believe in the company.

The only reason to hire someone at a above the market rate is if you're
funded, and have no technical compentance of your own.

So, its doubtful that you'd be a startup employee.... but you're the right
type to be a founder.

------
blrgeek
0\. 1st employee. 1.6%. Not much left of the company. Was also taking cut in
salary.

------
Lorem-ipsum-100
#1 Startup:

Left before the first year. Company was acquired later. The payout is
engineers got to keep their job.

#2 Multinational:

The stock option I was granted once valued 500k at the peak of dotcom bloom.
In the short window before the crash I've cashed out about 40k. It goes toward
the down payment of the house. This might turn out to be the best financial
gain thus far.

#3 startup:

The firm has over 100M VC funding and 300 employee when I join. My stock
valued above 100k at acquisition. It has shrink about 25% when they are fully
vested.

#4 startup (current):

I took about 25% pay cut to join this startup. If the stock makes the same
money as startup #3 I will about break even. Financial aside I'm quite happy
working here.

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progolferyo
Fun and sensitive question! Taxes certainly bite big time, especially on on an
acquisition where its paid out as a bonus.

Longest engineer at the company when the acquisition happened, exit was around
~200k, pre-tax.

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mberning
Is flaming out considered an exit?

~~~
gregpilling
Yes, but not a good one.

~~~
mberning
My previous company was a little beyond the startup phase. I had a decent
amount of stock options. Nothing to retire off of, but it would have been a
nice pay day had the company grown to an appreciable size (i.e. valuation).
Unfortunately that never came to be. After a few haphazard mergers and
acquisitions and a downright terrible financial performance my options were
worthless when I left. My new employer is a much smaller startup. We'll see
how it goes over the next year or two.

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kposehn
I haven't exited yet; I'm instead a co-founder raising money.

This has been a good thread to read about how I should protect my employees. I
firmly believe in this rule: give a good deal to your VC's, co-founders and
employees as it will make it even easier for your next startup to succeed.

We've got a nice big options block for our employees and I want to be able to
say to every person in the company that has options that they'll get a cash-
out.

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alenlpeacock
software engs in the startup I joined made anywhere from tens of thousands up
to more than half a million (depending on how early they joined, when they
sold their options, etc).

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consultutah
Should be a poll

~~~
zackattack
Dunning-Kruger, hello?

~~~
DrJ
wouldn't commenting be even worse on it? commenting reveals an 'identity' and
'source' poll could be ran with 'only if you actually participated'.

They both have same problem of misrepresentation but at least the latter is
easier to visualize.

~~~
zackattack
It's a lot easier to criticize someone AFTER you receive data. Hindsight bias.

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dgottlieb
2nd engineer, started right out of college. Was always being paid what I felt
to be market value. Had ~2% in stock after a re-incentivizing due to a near
bankruptcy after failing to close a Series B. Turned into 180K after 5 years
at the company. This company had good founders, so perhaps that's why this
seems to be the exception; former CTO/CEO of a large company that was
acquired.

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earle
This about sums up HN these days -- not a single answer in these 166
responses! Just a bunch of unrelated (and for the most part), uneducated
opinions!

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borism
dunno, never calculated total amount. maybe few years' salary worth at most,
spread over a few years. nothing to write home about, yet :)

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trotsky
s/when/if

