Ask HN: From tech startup to finance. Bad move?
I was the first engineer at a tech startup in SV and, after building and leading an engineering team and scaling the company to ~40 people, I was passed on for a promotion, since the founder decided to bring in an experienced VP of engineering to take on the majority of my activities. I don't have anything against this new guy (except that he is not a very talented leader IMHO), but what disappoints me is that I have been completely excluded from every "leadership/management" task without being given any constructive feedback, and I am just expected to quietly switch to an individual contributor role after 3+ years of leading major initiatives.
The whole thing has been very ego-crushing for me, so I made my resume circulate through the help of a well connected recruiter in order to keep my options open. I got in touch with two very famous hedge funds for a backoffice role (cloud computing stuff: modern infrastructure management, rearchitecting of legacy applications, containers, ...) and the interviews have been very mature (no Google style). I got an offer from both places, they are localed in NYC and Chicago so I would have to move.
I have fundamentally two questions:
- What to do with the reasonable number of options I have vested
- Is this really a good career move? Am I just going to be extremely disappointed in a few months? FWIW, I worked in big enterprises before, but software was their core business, never trading/finance
Current employment numbers (startup):
- Salary: 160k
- Bonus: ~10k a year
- Equity: ~1% as ISO (after dilutions), of which I currently vested 80% (the startup is definitely on an upwards trajectory, at the moment exercising those options and paying the AMT tax would cost me around ~100k or more)
New offer by the hedge funds (they are pretty much comparable):
- Salary: 200k
- Bonus:
- 200k a year (minimum guaranteed by the contract, every year)
- 50k sign-on + relocation bonus
Thank you!
15 comments
[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 36.9 ms ] threadFrom the interviews it seems like these companies are actually looking for people with distributed systems experience (think of SV's devops + architect skills), and willing to pay well for it (I've heard of several people leaving Google/FB/Netflix/... to join these groups).
Hedge fund pros and cons: * higher pay * more volatile pay * what is your long-term career path at the hedge fund?
Startup pros and cons: * probably a nicer work environment than a hedge fund * you feel disenfranchised
The simpler argument would be to simply take the job that pays the most. I think there are very few exceptions to that rule.
An exception would be where the toll on your physical or mental health is greater than is warranted by the extra pay.
In my book anything that burns you out is not worth any amount of money < $enough_to_retire.
If you were given the choice, which route would you take?
In your shoes, I don't know what I would choose, I don't know what to expect from the financial world. Money surely sounds nice.
As a further data point: if the interviews at Google/FB/... were not so crazy, and if I were given some sort of choice on the area to work on at those companies, I would have definitely tried the interview with them as well, but what I liked about these hedge funds is that I was interviewing for a specific role and so the interview process was pretty much focused around that, without anyone asking me to code an rb tree on a whiteboard.
When you're done there, go to some other industry. Medical devices, alternative energy, aerospace, porn. Live in different regions, different countries.
That's the beauty of software. If you're open to it, you can learn a lot about different parts of the economy.
Or did you specialize in whatever your startup does when you were in school?
I didn't specialize in school, I like to have a very broad set of CS skills, I found it immensely useful being able to know a bit of everything.
At the same time, in the startup I've been able to specialize in particular aspects of modern cloud infrastructures, and that's what got me in the door with these funds.
> I've been able to specialize in particular aspects of modern cloud infrastructures
That's fine, great in fact, but not quite what I meant. It was more of a leading question, at a higher level: you probably didn't specialize in whatever your startup is fixing or disrupting.
My suggestion was at a higher level than what we study at school.
How does a hedge fund work.
How does a medical device work, and not kill its patient.
How does an airplane keep itself flying, and keep its pilots and home office and suppliers informed about and in control of its performance. How do we keep passengers comfortable and entertained.
How does an airplane in flight fit in with all the other airplanes in flight and on the ground.
How does FedEx tell me that my new phone just entered their facility in Wuhan China (which they just did), and deliver on their statement that it will be here Thursday at 10:30am (which I believe will probably happen, plus or minus hours).
In that example, there's at least two parts: The logistics of actually moving that phone and knowing where it is, and the system that's keeping me, the customer, informed.
How do first responders know where to go, and how do we know who to send first? How does a wind turbine work.
"What do people do all day?" (One of my favorite books, and I'm pretty old.) https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/313375.What_Do_People_Do...
For all of the above, and much else, software is both essential and incidental. It's the larger picture, what are we actually doing with software, that's most interesting (to me). We're lucky enough that we can move around and see all of that.
[1] Cash portion of compensation is significantly better
[2] Diversification of experience improves. You have big enterprise, start-up and now would add trading/finance to the mix
[3] If you keep a tight rein on lifestyle inflation you could easily save enough money to become your own angel investor in 4 to 6 years from now if you really find you prefer the start-up environment
[4] If you stay the ego-crushing aspects will continue to weigh heavily on you and create daily stress.
My 2 cents: Try to find someone doing the work you are about to do at the HF and have a conversation with them. I don't see any comment on here yet from someone who can speak from experience at a HF BO. That's a worthwhile coffee or phone call if you can find someone. Don't believe job descriptions, recruiters, or interviewers at the HF about what you will be doing day to day. Speak to someone who is a third party about the type of work in general (try Linkedin, Bloomberg, friends or whatever networks you are a part of to find someone to talk to). Ask them about the work, day to day, pros and cons, career progressions, lifestyle, etc...
Second part of the answer. NYC and Chicago, and the two firms, are VERY different culturally. Think about what city you want to live in and what firm culture you prefer.
I vote NYC over Chicago if you can. And then go for it, you have little to lose - if the work sounds interesting based on conversations with people actually doing it and the city is a place you wouldn't mind trying out living in, what are you worried about? You can always move back to SF or move to a different company, HF or startup in NYC.
As for the vested options Q. You haven't given enough info for anyone on here to answer that prudently.
Some people's sign on bonus will be negotiated to consider vested options at a previous job. Your offer looks standard and that you haven't negotiated anything on that part. Up to you if relevant, just sharing people do this. The HF is fully aware of what options are so you can bring it up with them if you choose.
Congrats again.