The other professional problem that well-run startups have is that it's easy for early employees to feel like they're held to a different set of standards than the founders for professional growth. Essentially, founders are given chances to succeed in roles they never could otherwise, and early employees miss all the coaching and context that might help them succeed in similar roles.
Let's imagine I was a 26-year-old developer interested in startups. I have two paths:
- I found a company. I have the chops to hack something together with my cofounder, and maybe we make something of it raise a seed. We hire another couple engineers, and with a couple big logos in a good market, we raise an A. At this point, I've learned a ton about what makes a business work from other founders and I see (far too clearly) the gaps in my own knowledge. I hire some marketers / salespeople to work for me, and we keep making things work. At some point, maybe I choose to hire a professional CEO, and I stay on as CTO. I still have a lot of leverage in the company. I still go to board meetings.
- I join a company as the first employee, after they've raised a seed. I have good conversations with the other 26-year old founders over beer after work. I jump on the occasional phone call with customers and crank out features that they like based on that insight. We raise our A, though I'm still a software engineer since we only have 10 employees that all report to one of the founders. I quit seeing customers, because we hired a sales rep. We decide to hire management, and I'm considered for a line manager job, but we ended up hiring somebody externally. (She was awesome, glad we hired her, but I'm bummed I'm not reporting to the CEO anymore.) By the time we're 40 people, I don't talk to the founders much anymore, and I don't really understand what our bigger customers want. I don't have the influence I once did, and the codebase is too big for me to brute force that leverage through productivity. I start to look for another job.
There's nothing wrong with either story, but in the founder case, I was given a ton of chances and support. As an employee, I was given, at best, the support of a single manager while the company grew around me. This is fair, in some sense, but compared to the opportunities offered to the founders, it's far behind.
The other professional problem that well-run startups have is that it's easy for early employees to feel like they're held to a different set of standards than the founders for professional growth. Essentially, founders are given chances to succeed in roles they never could otherwise, and early employees miss all the coaching and context that might help them succeed in similar roles.
Let's imagine I was a 26-year-old developer interested in startups. I have two paths:
- I found a company. I have the chops to hack something together with my cofounder, and maybe we make something of it raise a seed. We hire another couple engineers, and with a couple big logos in a good market, we raise an A. At this point, I've learned a ton about what makes a business work from other founders and I see (far too clearly) the gaps in my own knowledge. I hire some marketers / salespeople to work for me, and we keep making things work. At some point, maybe I choose to hire a professional CEO, and I stay on as CTO. I still have a lot of leverage in the company. I still go to board meetings.
- I join a company as the first employee, after they've raised a seed. I have good conversations with the other 26-year old founders over beer after work. I jump on the occasional phone call with customers and crank out features that they like based on that insight. We raise our A, though I'm still a software engineer since we only have 10 employees that all report to one of the founders. I quit seeing customers, because we hired a sales rep. We decide to hire management, and I'm considered for a line manager job, but we ended up hiring somebody externally. (She was awesome, glad we hired her, but I'm bummed I'm not reporting to the CEO anymore.) By the time we're 40 people, I don't talk to the founders much anymore, and I don't really understand what our bigger customers want. I don't have the influence I once did, and the codebase is too big for me to brute force that leverage through productivity. I start to look for another job.
There's nothing wrong with either story, but in the founder case, I was given a ton of chances and support. As an employee, I was given, at best, the support of a single manager while the company grew around me. This is fair, in some sense, but compared to the opportunities offered to the founders, it's far behind.