Having worked for a few different startups as an engineer and architect, there are a lot of pro's and cons to working in this space. - You work long hours, tight deadlines, all under immense stress in an environment you're learning to navigate as you go. Sort of fly-by-your-pants stuff. Compensation can vary in terms of structure, take-home pay, and benefits, and at the end of the day you're not guaranteed to succeed as a company. At the same time, many of those cons are pros. You learn a lot, gain a tremendous amount of knowledge and confidence in your abilities to think, speak, and get sh*t done. And hopefully, you earn a fair amount of coin, especially if the startup is successful All that said, it can burn you out quick if you aren't prepared!

Reminds me of this reddit conversation where software developers explained how they work at FAANG and managed to get into positions where they can coast and only work 5-10 hours a week. But earn several 100k a year.

I've heard the best time to join a startup is right after they raise a Series A, because they already have some traction, and are hiring agressively.

Most people *do not* get such payouts at all. I've worked in tech for 16 years now. I only know a few people who made any kind of decent money on their equity. Most of those folks only made $50-200k. Only one friend really hit it big and made $500k when their startup IPO'd. I think luck is a big part of the game.

John, you are easily one of my all time fav youtuber! The quality of each of your content is amazing, so much work, so well planned, so much information. Big respect to your work!

🔥 really valuable content & definitely agree that being an early startup employee is not talked about enough compared with being a founder, etc.

Yes I've been working as a Software Engineer for 1 year and a half at a Sillicon Valley startup. Great salary, equity, and more. Hopefully I'll become wealthy in the future. Company has great funding, strong traction, and it's going very well.

Love the transparency! I agree with looking into who the investors are. It's important to know that the company is pursuing the right investors and not "random" investment money. This will also help you gain insight on the longevity of the company and the type of support it'll have.

Team John Coogan. Represent

Glad to see a new upload just in time for my morning breakfast

Hi John, appreciate these interesting and helpful videos. I wondered if you could create a video on how to get into the space of tech startups, what media to follow, which news outlets to read etc. You obviously have a good grip on the information out there, so would love it if you would share your open sources! Other than that, thanks for the videos!

Very interesting and important topic explained. I haven't seen anyone talking about it. Thanks so much!

Love your videos, informative as always.

Hey John, some feedback about the editing: I felt like this video had too many movie clips. I prefer seeing you and your energy come through your gestures and mimics!

Starting early is the best way of getting ahead to build wealth, investing remains a priority. The stock market has plenty of opportunities to earn a decent payouts, with the right skills and proper understanding of how the market works.

Great video and very insightful.

If you need to uncover and know all the variables that could lead to success for a startup company so you can decide whether to work for it or not, you might as well start your own company.

The MRJ-1-2 model is a descriptive model that delineates the processes of acceptance for the emergence of an entity or phenomenon in existence. It serves as an operational guide for analyzing any entity or phenomenon that has the potential for continuous emergence, growth, and transformation in existence. By intelligently identifying, selecting, and accepting itself through specific processes and procedures, it gains the potential for emergence in existence. Furthermore, any entity or phenomenon going through the process of acquisition of acceptance for its emergence in existence passes through the following stages: - Initiation (the emergence of a novel subject in the realm of necessities and current issues) - Manifestation (the appearance of structures in the light of solutions) - Establishment (clarification of principles, values, goals, etc.) - Raising (in progress and implementation, rising) - Nurturing (growing to the necessary extent) - Scaling (being acknowledged, being accepted) - Development (capable of development, expandable, revivable) - Rejuvenation (accepting necessary changes) It is completely free to use the MRJ-1-2 model, provided the source is credited.

These videos makes our days better

Haven't watched the video yet. But I know its gonna be informative. Thanks john

Can we just take a moment to give a shoutout to John for putting together such an effective summary of an otherwise often-overlooked issue that affects even my smartest friends in Silicon Valley?! I'm sharing this video with some of the college students I've been mentoring. It's a great way to prep for a career in the Valley

OP, you make it seem easier than it actually is. The unicorn startups where your stock option will be worth 100x what you paid for it are very rare. You're deceiving viewers who don't understand survivorship bias. I've joined several startups prior to IPO, 2 of them can be considered industry leaders in their niche, yet their stock still tanked after IPO (at it often does). You can definitely make 100k+ from options/stocks, but it's very rare to get millions this way, most companies will not be the next Google and your options will not 100x. Maybe if you're a super-early employee, but in that case your life will be hell for the next 5+ years before the IPO as you work 80+ hour weeks, sleeping at the office, fearing that in 6 months the company won't be able to raise the next round and will be forced to declare bankruptcy - definitely not the picture you painted in your video.

I have a cussin that just cashed out his stake for $12 million on a unicorn 🦄 startup he is working at

Hey. John. Do you edit all your videos yourself?? It's really good

You need to also time the economic cycle right. Like right now any startup just starting will have a hard time getting funding.

*Great channel and highly informative video. I was able to retire early and also successful by building a passive income stream, living frugal, and investing. I’ve always said this to everyone that Investing is key to financial freedom*

The wisest thing that should be on everyone's mind currently should be. To invest in different streams of income that doesn't depend on government, especially with the current economic crises around the world.

Pls make a video on how to avoid/reduce government regulations when your startup is predicted to be great.

It is a *high risk high reward* scenario, like all the eggs in one basket. It doesn't offer diversification (I can not work in a two startups at the same time). Rather I would buy small cap stocks, or unlisted companies and diversify.

I never tought about this, thanks john as always for the amazing content

Great video!

Hello John. Please what mic do you use? Your channel motivates me to start my to KZfaq journey

This video needs attention. Thanks for doing this.

A lot of people made tons of money from companies with ideas that didn't seem to make much sense; a lot of companies with great team and ideas ended up in a failure after several years of grinding. Even investors who put money in the companies didn't know how their portfolio companies would end up. They typically do educated-shotgun (invest in 10-20 or more and hope that 2-3 would become wildly successful). Moderna could have failed or be a couple decades of long-grind without much reward for employees, if it was not because of the pandemic. But shotgun approach won't work well for employees, as employees typically have to work for one company for at least few years. Plenty other people make even more in big established companies that have a decade long good run (think Apple). So it is really not as simple as it is described here.

Bro your videos are the best! I can't thank you enough

john u are gonna hit 1mill subs soon , your contents are 🔥keep doing it we love the knowledge u give us

Liked the video very much. Very informative. But, I think it would be even better if you could make it as some kind of a structured lesson with a list of steps, instructions, schemes. Those footages from movies just make it more difficult to focus on the valuable information you provide. Thank you. 👍

As a dev this is really good!!

great video , nice content and thorough research .sorry what was the name of the movie you showed at 14:31 in the video

Video quality is good, you implement a lot of good tactics.

Great video

Coming from a startup founder, saying that Theranos wasn't backed by any large backers is false. They actually had some of the most prestigious backing which played into why they were able to get away with it. Other than that solid take!

informative as always

Launched my startup four weeks ago. So excited

How do your movie clips align so perfectly?

Nice video

another insightful video.

the value in this video is in tons!

“Without getting lucky” - goes on to immediately describe the process of getting lucky by backing a winning horse. 97.6% of “seed” series startups never get to an exit event (read: employees never make a single $ from their stock). Only 17% of series A startups go on to have an exit event. You are *very much* gambling when you accept compensation in the form of equity in a startup. While the odds are better for later-stage (56% of series B, 86% of series C startups have a successful exit), the chances they will sell or go public at a price that makes your equity worth very little or even $0 also goes up. Generally less risk also means less rewards with later-stage startups. How do VCs deal with this? Why are they OK with investing when the failure rate is so high? You cannot think like a VC when picking a startup to work at; while you can only work for ~one startup at a time, VCs have anywhere from dozens to hundreds of investments in different startups at any given time, and they know their profits will come from just the handful that succeed and make it big. That’s right, when that startup tells you they’re backed by “big name brand VC,” that VC *knows* they’ll probably fail, and is ok with that. Of course they try to pick winners, but they only need something like 1/20 investments they pick to really succeed in order to make money. Even with those odds, VCs spend weeks to months scrutinizing each startup they choose to invest in, and have teams of people doing due diligence. If you work an average of 4 years per startup, that means you’d have to work 80 years to have the same odds as a VC to pick a winning startup, and that’s *assuming* you can pick your startups as carefully as they do (when was the last time a startup handed you all their financial records before you decided to take a job with them?) How do you like your odds? Make your decision to join a startup based on the assumption that it will fail and your equity will be worth $0. Would you still consider your compensation at least adequate, would you still be growing your career, would you still be happy day-to-day and enjoy the people you work with even if the company failed? If the answer is no to any one of these questions under the assumption you’ll *never* be able to make a single dollar from your RSUs/options, you’re not ready to join that startup.

Hey John, How about working for Mammoth Biosciences ? It was founded by Jennifer Doudna (inventor of CRISPR, nobel laureate and a PhD from Harvard) and even Tim Cook funded 'em with 30 million dollars. I'm not sure if that company is going to make more money. Edit : And is it possible for you to recommend 1 or 2 companies to work for

John what are your thoughs on crypto I don't see where is the value?

The moral: avoid working at startups whose founder has been featured on Forbes! 🤣

As some one who has spent 10 years working at startups, this video felt extremely click-baity. You started off by saying most people only focus on billionaires, but then proceed to basically just talk about their companies (effectively the same thing). Startup employees only get rich from that startup IF they're lucky and picked the right one. The most honest investor will tell you just how much luck plays into it. I guess maybe I was expecting a "here are things you can do to build wealth while taking a pay cut to work at a startup" and instead got a video that basically just says "if you pick the right start up, you may make millions." Either way, enjoyed the content and subscribed. Look forward to more!

1. Join a great startup.

Gold 💥

Man! You're letting a lot of secrets out here lmao

Silicone Valley Jake Tran!

Honestly it’s much easier and be an early investor then sacrifice a startup Vs a well paying job

Can someone please explain to me how you work as an employee at a startup company and still walk away with nothing when the company fails, when you're being paid on a monthly salary?

Praying for IPO every night.

Moment of silence if you work at a startup and wasnt offered stock. The US has better market forces at play.

Perfect title.

That was a good video!

Except WeWork start-up employees got shafted as well.

I mean it makes sense to me

anyone else hear the baby in the background?

Sadly "Hustlers following the hype-wave" sounds like what hype-following investors will invest in. Can be bought out early on whilst there's convergence in that hyped-up market, and you cash-out big and early

I'm starting a company with an existing competitor, any advice?

Awesome video! Am I going crazy… I swear I heard a baby in the background. That or my place is haunted 🤪

Hi, I love your videos

and the method was actually getting lucky D:

This title came from Naval Ravkants thread

sign me up John! Sounds like a fun adventure 😄

Why illustrate all your videos with cringey Wolf of Wall street scenes ? He's a literal criminal

Professionnal investor invest in thousand company because they dont know wich one will succeed but you simple employe will make the right choice with one try.... suuurrreee .... You can only connect the dot backward

LOL some will dislike to reveal their secret.

wow i remember when you were at 6k

TLDR : rich parents

In your new picture you seem.. umm, sleepless, tired? Why use that on thumbnails? Just my observation, thanks for your videos!

If you guys have this much knowledge,why aren't you billionaires or millions though🤔?

colt stelle what are you doing here 😊😊😊😊

No employee at any company ever get "RICH"

Hey John you should mention the WhatsApp spammers that have been spamming in comments pretending to be you. Some people might actually fall for it. You can mention it in a pinned comment. Thanks 🤸‍♂️

how to be a leech 101

Had to stop at Moderna. Bye.

P

The premise of this video is a lie

first

This is exactly why I'm buying as much Hedera (HBAR) as I possibly can. It's the startup to end all startups for the next big leap in technology.

If you have a startup idea. Comment down . Let's talk and grow together 😊