Ask HN: How can I work towards building a company while employed?
My plan :
- continue learning while on the job
- prepare for interviews so that I can apply to companies that are friendly to side projects (stripe, gitlab, github and a bunch of other such companies. Please mention companies that are ok with remote workers and are side project friendly, even startups paying $30,000 work for me)
- build side projects in my free time that demonstrate my skills
- maybe participate in Pioneer.app tournaments so I can network
- basically work on stuff that won't become a company
- once I get a job at a more side project friendly company, I'll start working on my ideas.
As you can see, it's quite a shitty situation to not be able to pursue my side projects that could become companies, but it is what it is and I want to make the most of the next year or so. Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thank you.
192 comments
[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 228 ms ] threadThere are also a number of large companies that will point blank refuse to negotiate contracts, to the point of pulling the job offer if you don't play ball. Of course they will still negotiate when they feel they need to, but you're unlikely to have the necessary leverage if you're only starting your career.
Realistically speaking, unless your side gig is a direct competitor or becomes a massive success, you're probably fine. And you can reduce risk further by not launching your company while still employed, which makes it that much harder for them to notice and/or prove you worked there at the same time.
FYI, I am from a developing country as well.
If you want a job at something like gitlab. Hangout on their open-source project, learn their codebase, and send in patches. Even if they are simple docs patches. Send in 50 of those and you will start to learn the devs. Ask one of them what it is like to work there, ask them to refer you, etc. The CEO of gitlab is constantly on HN (I swear he has an alert for mention of gitlab). So, he will likely see this post. My point, take some initiative and try not to go through the conventional recruiter pipe (apply on website and no one ever gets back to you cycle). Doing this, has worked out really well for me in the past, and it will work for you too. Sure, it is more work but gets you ahead of everyone else as you are making an effort. Be strategic about this and really choose who you want to work for and go after them. Having something like, hey, I patched 50 minor typos in your code/docs goes a long way, between you and some nobody!
Also, I remember that when the GDPR got implemented in the EU, I had to agree on a new contract amendment in which the company legally had to list all the data that was collected on its employees (e.g. emails, personal info like age, address and income, ...).
That means even under GDPR, your employer could (and should) monitor what you're doing on their company-owned assets.
Save the headache and use your own equipment. At the very least have a personal VM that you run to do your personal work on.
I am a bit surprised that multiple people here are living in such a permanent state of paranoia.
(but since the owner is the company....)
This is everywhere.
"I have a company laptop but there is no logging whatsoever."
I suggest they very well could be logging your web requests. This is very common.
It's not like your manager is necessarily even going to have access to this. They're not interested in what you are doing, generally.
But if there is a serious security problem, or a legal problem ... this will then be used.
If you work remotely obviously they can't.
But if you work in an office, there's a very good chance they are.
It may be that your employer doesn't do that. You would be extremely in the minority. Even connecting to the employers network, either from VPN or at the office (can get everything on the network up to layer 7), even using their DNS server (can log every DNS request), even using their AV software (can read every file on your system, even removable media), even using their proxy (can watch all your Internet traffic and decrypt SSL), or MaaS tools (game over, full access, including keylogging), there is a ton of tracking and monitoring that can be done from the most basic tools. Most web proxies are capable of breaking SSL requests to inspect the traffic and then rebuilding it before passing it on. I work with a technology that does deep packet inspection and full payload capture on every flow that hits the network.
It may be that your company doesn't do any of that. But before you go coaching people to quit their jobs or assume they're not being tracked, you should realize this is extremely common and any company who does not do it is putting themselves, their employees, and their customers at extreme risk when it comes to security. The most basic of malware could bring down the entire company if they don't have a proxy or AV. And if anyone can attach any device to the internal network without needing any controlling software or inspection software, if anyone can send whatever data they want out of the network, it's not a question of if you will be hacked, it's a question of how long have you been hacked and you just don't know it.
They're not using monitoring software to watch your Amazon shopping habits. They're using it to protect the company, their employees, and their customers.
Rubbish. Most companies don't even have an IT department and are too busy trying to keep the business going and make payroll to be worried about malware or what their employees are Googling.
I agree with being cautious, but by the sounds of it you don't know what "most" businesses are like in the real world.
Companies without an IT department are extremely unlikely to let their developers take a company-owned laptop home, for the sole reason that they don't have developers or company-owned laptops.
If you have an IT department (or person) who pushes updates or otherwise controls (or can control) software configuration on your machine, there is at least a decent chance they are also doing at least some of:
- logging all traffic on company network (+ VPNs, of course)
- MITM all SSL traffic on this network (and do filtered logging based on deep packet inspection and/or endpoints)
- above including personal devices connected to that network
- logging all software configuration changes on your machine
- logging all network requests on your machine (regardless of network)
- logging all crash logs and/or other OS level interactions
- timetracking app usage
- logging all communication layer traffic (i.e. mic usage, camera usage, endpoints)
less likely: keylogging or other direct monitoring.
In my limited experience all of this stuff is too logistically complex for small companies, but as soon as you start centralizing IT servicing at all, you will be offered products with some of these capabilities along with more standard virus scan etc.
And ideally don't bring work equipment home (i.e. laptop). This could be used against you. Low probability but high impact for you.
Your motivation will tank at times... in those moments its extremely helpful to have paying customers--you'll find your motivation replenishes a lot easier.
- No one can stop you from learning. Learn what you need to to help prepare you to do something of your own. BUT do not use ANY company assets/laptop/network etc. to do the learning/research etc to be on the safe side.
- Build something. Yes definitely. On the side. even if just a concept. Tinker with stuff. Again do it outside of your company time/assets etc.
Remember that most companies won't give a shit unless you actually become big and noticeable. For example, I am sure google won't come after you for creating something that makes you $10,000/Month and you did not directly steal from them. I could be wrong but I am sure google has better things to do.
Finally, Do not let anything or anyone stop you from what you really want to do in life. life is short and It is not worth living it doing things that you don't want to do.
* Pick a tech stack and get really good at it. You can do it at your company's time and equipment as it is gaining knowledge.
* Give yourself 6 months to blog and contribute to open source on your own laptop. Get something decent to get started. If you feel buying a Macbook Pro or a similar Dev laptop is a huge expense, look for options to rent it in the short term. Consistency is key, ensure that you are pushing out a new post every week.
* Get into a freelancing gig where you are able to set your own times. This will give you a sense of business priorities and how to pitch and get clients. Conduct trainings and workshops and charge market rates for your expertise.
* Then if you really find a problem that needs more than your mind and two hands to solve, by all means setup a company, hire people and do things. As a developer looking for freedom from the man, freelancing is a good way to gain that freedom. Your own employer might hire you on your terms for twice the pay he is paying you currently.
2. An hour or two every day and code marathons on weekends can get your a basic version of product out in a few months.
3. Never give in to temptation to steal office hours to work on your project.
The problem is that the employer pretends to own all Intellectual Properties produced by the employee while in contract. Be it during code marathons, night hours, week-end time...
I used to have a contract of that kind, and I found another job to keep ownership of my weekend pet projects.
Sure, the company will not want him to suddenly leave to launch his company, but the way to combat that is by making the position more attractive, and screening for it when hiring.
The American view on labour seems quite similar to slavery.
Let’s say you’re a scientist. Your employer sets you up in a lab (that you could never afford on your own) and gives you the task of solving a problem that, if solved, would be worth millions to the company. One night you go home thinking about the tough problem. The next morning at home you have a shower and suddenly you realize the solution!
Who owns the solution? Did you solve it by yourself? Can you now take the solution and launch your own company? If the company puts itself up for sale can they claim ownership of the solution?
This is why in the U.S. these “the company owns everything while you’re our employee” clauses exist. Consider them legal laziness: It’s easier to declare ownership of everything than it is to negotiate with every employee over who owns what under what circumstance.
Edit: These clauses are enough to take to trial. At the very least a deep-pocketed employer can scare off investors from investing in the employee.
I am of course talking about innovations or just work done in unrelated areas, while employed.
The idea that an employer owns everything you create is offensive to human dignity and happily that is not how it works in Europe.
You are even encouraged to start your own company, in some countries you have a legally enshrined right to take a LOA for six months and work on your business, and then come back to your old employer.
On this point in particular, if you're doing pet project work outside of working hours, then your employer should have absolutely no say on what you're doing. You wouldn't have them manage your hobbies, your social life or your dating life, that would be unreasonable, same goes for side projects.
yea if I am the owner of the company, but if I am the employee, i would want to work on my own project while also taking money from the company.
Different position some time need different way to handle things.
1. The employer is paying you to help their product/service succeed. It is unprofessional and immoral to deceive them. I've seen some colleagues do this and I was disappointed in them.
2. Work you produce at your place of employment belongs to the employer. It depends on the contract and I am not a lawyer, but it's best to protect your intellectual property.
BUT I think while you're employed you should try to learn how budgeting, cashflow, capex/opex, taxes, accounting, etc. work.
This will be very helpful for the job you already have, and also for your side project and any future job.
This is default here as well (Germany), but I only interpret this as stuff done during work time. So the stuff I come up with and the code I write at the office on my workstation is automatically owned by my employee. That's fine, because if it wasn't, that would cause all kinds of legal trouble should I ever leave the company.
But if I create things in my free time at home, on my own equipment, then that's MINE, and I might start a company from it -- the only trouble might come if there is reason to believe I stole code/trade secrets (e.g. starting a company in the same niche) or my employee might assume I worked on my it during my paid hours (e.g. all of a sudden bootstrapping a 100 employee company, while getting paid 40h a week until yesterday).
Of course your contract is probably very different, but I have a difficult time imagining that what you're doing in your unpaid time is owned by your employee. Logic here is: You're paid to work a specified time of hours per time interval (e.g. 40h/week). What you do there is owned by your boss. Then if your boss wanted to own all you do/come up with outside of that time, he would need to buy that time from you as well. E.g. to own all you come up with, even in your sleep, you should be eligible for a 7*24h/week compensation. Of course this is more morals than law, but well, maybe you just misinterpreted the wording?
//edit: Mind the discussion below this thread. IANAL, and my moral point of view might not match the legal reality.
This is a very dangerous attitude. I'm from The Netherlands, consulted a lawyer on this matter, and she confirmed it was definitely an issue. I proceeded to make it explicit in the contract that it only covers IP created during work time and/or on company hardware.
What you're saying is definitely understandable, but in my experience, it's not how the legal system is currently looking at these matters.
edit: see geocar's reply.
You are however fairly safe if it's completely different from your work, for example, pottery or writing fiction (assuming your company does neither).
As for "as part of this employment relationship", I'm not a lawyer but I wouldn't assume that it applies only to what you do at the office. It might very well apply to anything while you are employed there. You need to clear the scope of that with HR or a lawyer.
You definitely don't want to base your company on shaky legal grounds. You might lose your company, your product, and your job. It probably won't look good in your Arbeitszeugnis either.
If everyone acts in good faith Then nobody should end up in jail.
If too many people end up in jail Then major problems could occur.
That's not entirely accurate: You're required to submit it to your employer if it could be related to your work, see especially §18 (1-2) and §19
https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/arbnerfg/BJNR007560957.ht...
The difference is that I am not allowed to reuse that work somewhere else (e.g. my own project) with my contract, but from what you say that would always be possible. Also what you say means I could always sell work I do on the job to someone else, e.g. a direct competitor. So I am not sure if that's really right ;-)
> Copyright should neither be transferable in whole nor in part. Rather, the author should only be able to grant someone else the right to use the work in a certain way.
Nach dem geltenden Recht kann das Urheberrecht als Ganzes und in seinen Teilen (z. B. das Vervielfältigungsrecht, das Aufführungsrecht) abgetreten werden. Nur die aus dem Urheberpersönlichkeitsrecht erwachsenden Befugnisse, wie z. B. das Recht, Entstellungen des Werkes zu verbieten, sind unübertragbar. Der Entwurf sieht - wie das österreichische Recht - von einer derartigen unterschiedlichen Regelung der Übertragbarkeit der einzelnen urheberrechtlichen Befugnisse ab. Das Urheberrecht soll zukünftig weder im ganzen noch teilweise abtretbar sein. Vielmehr soll der Urheber einem anderen nur das Recht einräumen können, das Werk in bestimmter Weise zu nutzen. Das Urheberrecht selbst verbleibt dabei, belastet mit dem Nutzungsrecht, dem Urheber. Hierdurch wird sichergestellt, daß der Urheber auch dann, wenn er die wirtschaftliche Auswertung seines Werkes einem anderen überläßt, stets eine gewisse Kontrolle über das weitere Schicksal seines Werkes behält.
http://www.urheberrecht.org/law/normen/urhg/1965-09-09/mater...
deepl.com english translation:
Under the applicable law, copyright may be assigned in its entirety and in its parts (e.g. the right to reproduce, the right to perform). Only the powers conferred by the moral right, such as the right to prohibit the distortion of the work, are non-transferable. Like Austrian law, the draft refrains from such a different regulation of the transferability of individual copyright powers. In future, copyright should neither be transferable in whole nor in part. Rather, the author should only be able to grant someone else the right to use the work in a certain way. The copyright itself remains, burdened with the right of use, the author. This ensures that even if the author leaves the economic exploitation of his work to another person, he always retains a certain control over the further fate of his work.
Sadly, it sucks even more than some people imagine. So while I'm also not a lawyer, I will gladly play the Devil's advocate here.
If you have a salary, you are actually paid for the work product of the whole month. (As opposed to a wage for time worked.) Well, actually you are paid for honestly trying, but your contract transfers usage rights related to your work, so this has nothing to do with hours worked. They would also have to pay your salary, if they say you can stay at home and do nothing, because nothing to do.
Having your work time limited to 40h a week has nothing to do with transfer of rights, as it is a different realm of law. This is just to protect you (or your employer) from you being overworked. (Cynics might say: this was invented by politicians/unions to get votes, or by employers that don't want their human resources damaged.) Anyway: this has nothing to do with your pay and the rights you sell. It might even work against you, as you have to use your "free time", to get fit for work again. (Yes, yes!) While secondary employment is not generally forbidden in Germany (and contract clauses which say so don't last in court), except for competition, your employer of course needs to know, because he also has a say in whether or not your other activities are against their legitimate interest: e.g. if it is indeed to be deemed competion or you are overworking yourself this way and having this drain your energy away from your employers work might be a valid reason to stop it. (Of course: in the end, the court may decide if one side sues, hopefully in a commensurate way.) But you may say: but this is like overtime (it is not: you did it voluntarily and overtime is ordered), and overtime has to be paid even for salaried employees in certain cases (again: different laws, has nothing to with the rights you sell as part of your employment and only with protection from overworking and your compensation for time because of the imbalance between stipulatory and accomplished hours -- hint: if your employer or a labour court thinks your employer owes you (as a salaried employee) overtime compensation, it is because you are still way below a decent salary ... but this is getting off topic).
So while it is true you cannot transfer your Urheberrecht in Germany, as pizzapill wrote, (because it is connected to you as a person, with one exception: it is transfered to your heirs after your dead, but if you're dead, you rights are very limited anyway) you transfer the Nutzungsrechte (usage rights) as part of your contract. And here the employers try to get as much as possible. Not only because of greed (but we would not rule that out, would we?), but simply for legal safety: you cannot easily disentangle one work from another if it is basically the same in the law (like "computer program" -- if the creation of these type of work is your job). Sure you and I can easily see, this program has nothing to do with your dayjob, but can your employer? In a tiny shop, maybe. In a big corporation: not so much. A big software company has so many fields of business, products and services, your manager and their manager and their manager cannot possibly know if your free time project goes against the business interest of the company if you do it independently of the company, so the contracts generally assume it does. (And it probably actually does: given a big enough company you will most certainly have teams in other divisions building similar things as you do in your free time, even if it is only in some tiny research departement on the other side of the world. And I mean plural "teams": they often don't know from each other. Think your boring business software employer does not do cool IoT stuff in some unknown lab? Think again, you haven't networked enough and don't know your company.) And for the work time + work equipment / free time + private equipment argument: yeah, I would also say so, I am paid for this, but not for that ... ...
But same kind of work (programming), and company can possibly use it for their business (you don't know, even if you think you do) or using even similar code snippets in both programs (and that happens, even only in non-business logic parts of the code doing unimportant stuff) would unfortunately lead to a situation with possibility of conflict. After all, they pay you, to program "things that can be useful to them", so that's your job. Does that mean you can sell them this specific program, just because they haven't yet ordered you to write it in your work time? What do you want to do if they order you at work to write something like you have written in your free time? Being sulky? Writing a "totally different" program from your free time program just because you want to waste their time and money? Bringing your home-grown program which violates all company quality standards to work? You cannot win either way. As said before, the time when you did it, does not matter. (Except of course: before the start and after the end of the employment, you are free (from this employer), but as long as you are emloyed, it does not matter if it weekend.) It is all complicated, because it is not just some stupid and easy to follow rules. Law is not what one side thinks is right, but often times a reconciliation of interests, and it gets messy.
Ask yourself: could a reasonable third party, without knowing your or your employers intentions or even technical details, draw a clear line between your free time work and the stuff you are paid to work on, only by looking at your free time project and the kind of work you and your colleages do in the office? If the only product of your employer is monitoring software and you write the stereotypical Tetris clone: yeah, that case might be easy. Real companies and useful free time projects? Not so much.
Also to train you to think like a reasonable third party: think of a bricklayer laying bricks in his "free time". (Sounds a bit odd, doesn't it?) When would this be acceptable, when wouldn't it? Not so easy. Of course you have to give something up for getting paid.
I would suggest not being a salary slave, but that would be hypocritical of me, because I am.
Get paid enough, save enough, make a clean cut, start project later.
Have other hobbies, go out in the sun, meet some friends, life is too short.
As others wrote: the programming is the easy part of a business, you can easily solve that after you lost your chains.
The line I draw: if it is only for my amusement and noone else can access the work, I will do it for myself. (Strictly speaking, this may also be a relevant work, but that's the line I draw. Some may say: daring, some may say: cowardly. Probably right. Both of them.)
Getting an exception for works within your area of work, for which you do not have to to transfer rights into contract supplement, should be possible at reasonable employers, but check before you start creating the work, don't let them think your work as employee will suffer, and if is commercial, a side-business or similar: that's another independent problem to take care of (no competition, maximum work time as required by law may be applicable, and so on). (Contract supplements are done all the time for more trivial stuff, no big deal. The world changes, and so do contracts.) A small employer might even say: if your work is not in this and this business field, we don't care. For bigger ones it will be the other way around: you will have to be specific on what you want to do and some legal department will check business interests, IP problems, if it is far enough away from your departments work, and so on. This might as well limit the work you can do in the company, so check your career plans.
Check if you need to program at all. The ready solution might be available as open source already. These days many employers also have open source policies, giving you some additional free space for your programmi...
Anybody has any experience with this. How did you got in? What was your experience with it?
We found the tournament valuable, since we were able to receive feedback every week. The challenge of having to submit a progress update each week was also a great motivator.
We eventually stopped participating though, for a couple of reasons. Primarily, based on the time we were spending, and the returns we were getting, it wasn't worth it anymore. As we went on, the comments and feedback we received became less and less valuable, as other players continued to "game the system." I also had some serious concerns about lack of transparency with scoring, which made it hard to understand why we scored what we scored.
That said, a friend of mine was selected as a Pioneer and he says it's a good experience. I like the team and they've been responsive when I emailed them. I think the most important thing is to make sure that as you continue to participate, you make sure the tournament is continuing to provide value to you, like all things. It certainly was valuable to us at the beginning, but eventually lost its value as we grew.
If you have any questions, don't hesitate to reach out. You can contact me through Keybase, which is in my profile.
At minimum this should be at least one hour a day but 3 hours would be ideal.
Schedule the time and stick to it religiously and you will see results.
* on your own equipment
* on your own time
can be considered yours.
If you want to be extra sure, maybe consider first switching from employment to consulting? A friend of mine was primarily a consultant in pc-game-marketing space and then he founded a company, slowly building out a product.
On the other hand, I get that going for consulting gigs can be daunting, personaly, I prefer the cushy job that is mandated to pay me a salary every month, and to pursue my side-projects, I managed to negotiate a 4 day work-week. In the end the 3 day weekend mostly became a venue for more family time, but I still see it as a more viable future option, than working on a project an hour after my kid is asleep/before she wakes up :D
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_World
Yugoslavia is weird. But I would never dare insult somebody from former Yugoslavia by suggesting they are from a third-world country, it would be like asking for a black-eye :D (unless we are friends, and already drunk, then they might suggest it themselves?)
Even before, the self-description as Third World meant non-alignment (see e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bandung_Conference -- though Yugoslavia was not yet part of it in 1955). Before that, the term was coined by Alfred Sauvy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_World#Etymology) for the non-aligned countries, which had not much to say in the world of the Cold War with its big power blocs, despite representing the majority of the world population.
Having "Third World" mean "developing country" regardless of alignment with Eastern or Western Bloc came only after the end of the Cold War, as most were indeed developing countries.
Regarding the former Yugoslavian countries today: developing/developed? Depends on the country.
Negotiation looked like this:
They: so we would like to hire you,what salary would you have in mind?
Me: I'd rather you tell me, but I would especially be open, if I could have only 4 day work-week
They, after some back and forth: ok, we would give you X
Me: To clarify, X for a 4 day workweek? That sounds good!
Them: Ehm, we meant for full week, but no problem with 80% X for 4 day workweek
Me: ah, let me think it through
Them: we can make it 85% X for 4 day workweek, if that would make it better
Me: ok, will let you know ... by friday?
It is reasonable for your employer to ask you not to compete with them. It is not reasonable for them to say not to do side projects. And that phrase, or something similar, is what makes the contract say that. I always ask for it to be put into employment contracts, and refuse jobs without it.
Don't fill up all your free time with other work-related projects. You won't be able to learn as fast on the job if you're constantly depleting your cognitive reserves.
Do sports. Go out. Read a book. Don't load up on side projects you might not be able to finish.
You need to build strong tooling with abstraction to reduce, minimize boring, repetitive tasks.
Only then, you can maximize your company hours to do your own stuffs.
if they don't even let you do that, then i would firstly seek a job which does let you work for yourself on your own time, and then start really pushing for your own company. Learning how to do so is free for you to pursue, as long as you don't 'make' anything on the companies' system / resources it should be out of their sight and safe to do.
Probably the most practical solution here is to simply disregard this clause in the contract. Breaching such a clause would be a civil, not a criminal offense, and it is unlikely that a civil complaint would be even considered unless there was a lot of money at stake, and it was easy/cheap to prove/uphold. In order for it to be upheld your employer would have to spend a lot of time and energy deciding, and then proving what it was you built "on their time".
In other words, given that you don't actively publicize your own personal contribution to a commercial project its very unlikely that your employer can have any leverage over you in this regard.
Just don't do it on company dime and company time. This is what weekends are for, and it'd be up to the company to prove otherwise.
What I get from the OP's question is that the company owns anything he creates, independently of it being done on work time.