DISQUS

Harshal Vaidya · 3 years ago

looks like Auren got kicked out of a large company he wanted to get into. And hence all this vengeance.

Jim · 3 years ago

This is a bubble article if I ever read one. There are many A players or good people working at big companies. I know because as a startup I have tried to recruit them! Most are smart enough to know that there is little chance they are working at the one startup out of 100,000 that will turn into a YouTube so you have to be able to offer them something more then that and competing with big company benefits and pay can be challenging. Many startups will go under or sell for small amounts where employee options earn them little so offering a future is important. I have many friends that stayed put in late 90s era and were sitting pretty in 2002, when that boom went bust. Its all about risk. Some people, and smart ones too, choose to moderate their risk by taking a safer route. You have to respect that because that is sometimes the best choice.

Lynne Jolitz · 3 years ago

I've gotten to "work directly" with Vint Cerf, co-inventor of TCP/IP and "Father of the Internet". He's advised on my papers, patents, and companies. Is "Vince Cerf" his half-brother or something, Auren? :-)

too cool · 3 years ago

this reads as if it were written on a 45 minute train ride, stream of consciousness... you go from discussing the pros of working at youtube vs. google after the $1.65B acquisition, then talk about an "a" player's decisions being based on doing something cool rather than on compensation. i'm not sure there's any merit to the premise of this article, but if there is, it's undermined by the proposed arguments.

Kevin · 3 years ago

This is one of the most absurd articles I've seen in a long time. If I had funded this company, it would not have been with this idiot at the helm.

Rik · 3 years ago

This article really lacks warrants. He's basically trying to use an extreme title/position as a controversial gateway (or excuse) to just tell the world why he personally prefers a startup over a big company. His proof/reasoning that large companies are losing the A talent to startups and not vice versa is pretty silly and over generalized. I mean, he cites just one case of a person leaving Microsoft to build his own startup, when most techies I know can easily list ten cases where people left Microsoft for other big companies like Google or Yahoo. What a waste of reading time.

Elmur Fudd · 3 years ago

"If you are content with working 35-40 hours a week..."

which world are you living in man? more like 45-60 in all "big" companies I know of...

jack · 3 years ago

a sad article.... i am a start-up guy myself, so i started reading with interest... but i find the arguments used simplistic and lame. thumbs down.

Ben Metcalfe · 3 years ago

I think, Lynne, you're being unfairly snarky with Auren as "Vint" is a generally recognized abridged version of "Vincent". So technically he is not wrong by simply using the man's full name. It's no different to someone calling me Benjamin over Ben.

I think the article lacks warrants and is a little simplistic. Whilst I think the general observation is true, it's fair to say there are many "A" team people who continue to work for big corps - but then we don't know how much they've been able to inflate their salary accordingly. I don't think it's quite as 'back and white' as Auren writes... But at the end of the day if Yahoo! (just an example here folks!) wants to offer a potential 'A grader' x5 the normal salary to stay put then I can see why they would seriously consider taking it.

My take on all of this is that there are two types of people -- those who want to lead and those who want to follow. There is nothing wrong with the latter, it's just the type of folk who want to knuckle down a get on with the challenges of engineering/design/product developer/whatever their specialism.

The followers often go work for big companies because there often tends to be bigger rewards for the value of their craft, bigger challenges and the opportunity to work on higher-profile projects. Those who want to lead often go work in smaller companies or start-ups because it's more easier to be able to command the project or company.

The interesting case is those who are 'leaders' or those who become 'leaders' who work in a large company. Some get to rise to the top and be 'seen' and others get frustrated and leave. At the end of the day, you can only have so many 'visible' people in a large company. Think about it -- how many public-profile individuals - other than executives - can you name who work for Google? Microsoft, maybe a few more than Google because it's a larger company. And what about Yahoo!, other than those who work for Flickr or the other bought-in startups who had a public profile pre-Yahoo!?

It's the 'leaders' who perhaps are the most valuable to a company - big or small - and often they demand profile and reputation/status rather than pay. They'll go wherever they can get their status.

keanu · 3 years ago

big company needs more junior or middle level talents, but startup needs more senior or executive level talents. they have big different demands, I think.

john at PayPal · 3 years ago

this is obviously another journalistic maneuver by some CEO attempting to promote his name and startup. Well, nice work, however a little over simplification here and exaggeration. We all know there are tons of smart people in the Valley and everywhere. All these people have intrinsically different motivations, financial goals, and criterias in choosing jobs. Hence, attempting to say that big companies losing "A" players is a little too overarching. We all know how difficult it is to get the right talent and fit in hiring.

Please, do more analysis, stop doing all this "National Enquirer" type of article- it is not balanced, and will alienate the majority of readers who can't relate to this.

Ted · 3 years ago

This is one of the dumber articles I've read in a long time. Remind me to having nothing to do with "rapleaf" whatever that is.

John · 3 years ago

who is this butternut?

Tom Mojsa · 3 years ago

Excellent article. Startups are hard driving, onto the subject. No place for slackers or corporate BS. Auren, would you email me or call - I have a few questions to asks you by the way on another subject.

Casey · 3 years ago

Just read this excerpt from the article:

"In today’s hot startup market, it is essentially irrational to join a big company. That means that big companies _are_ _only_ attracting “B” and “C” players or they are attracting irrational A players."

That's got to be the worst claim I've ever heard in an online business article. To say something bold like that with no warrants sounds pretty 'irrational' to me. This article is such a marketing ploy for some day's work no business model easily spammable rating system. What's worse (besides the obvious attempt to lure the audience in with a misleading title that includes eye popping keywords like 'high tech', 'talent', 'war') is this guy is in no position to write an article like this. I don't see any of the 'big' high tech companies he mentions in the article on his resume. This is just a bad case of blog spam. Screw Rapleaf.

Gary McPherson · 3 years ago

I'm thinking plagiarism. This article reads like something out of the mid-90's. Let me give you a clue about big companies. They aren't going with 'C' players, they are going offshore. Yea, that dirty little word. BTW, so are startups. They are using these guys to replace their 'C' players and even some 'B' players.

While the retro memories were nice, this article simply does not hold water in this decade. Also, I don't know anyone who is hopping around like we did back in the 90's. There's a job change here and there, but those of us who survived the bubble don't see the point in making the same mistakes twice.

Roy · 3 years ago

Most of the growth in the world's economy happens via second tier companies and entrepreneurship of small businesses. The upper tier grows very slowly. Opportunities there are very limited. This is exactly how Silicon Valley became filled with giant companies; through the entrepreneurship of the small. Excellent article, and years ahead of people's ability to understand such things.

PJ Brunet · 3 years ago

I think what you're getting at is, the Internet (now especially) is wide-open with opportunity, where a lone gun can give up girls and hygiene for a few months, do the thing right and make it big. Same deal in the early 90's with the 3D animation gold rush.

But don't forget the multitudes of desperate, poor hackers out there working for peanuts places like oDesk, in crappy conditions I can't even imagine comfy here in Austin, Texas, USA.

Jeff Tokarz · 3 years ago

Big, small, 'A' players, 'B' players - so what! The job market is dynamic. An organization's ability to attract and retain the best talent is a function of challenging and rewarding work, competitive compensation, etc.

Lynne Jolitz · 3 years ago

Regarding Ben Metcalfe and "snarky":
Vint Cerf's full name is "Vinton G. Cerf", not "Vincent".
After all the work he and the other Internet pioneers have done to provide "instant access" information, it seems it takes very little effort to google "vint cerf" and read his official bio:
www.google.com/corporate/execs.html.
Of course, "snarky is as snarky does", right Ben?

John Doe · 3 years ago

I agree that the comments are not "well thought through" and it could have been approached at differently. With that said, I work at one of the multi-billion $ companies mentioned in the article and Auren is right. We have LOST A TON of folks. Annualized in Q3 we lost 25% of our workforce in certain areas. Were they all 'A' players? No, but many of them were. Really sad to see them go... I have my own reasons for not jumping into the startup world, but I'll save that for later.

Pete · 3 years ago

"if you make $130K at a big company, you’ll likely make $110K at a funded start-up"

Where does he get these figures from?

He also forgets to mention that during the critical period before the startup gets funded, you need to attract A-players who can work for next-to-nothing. And in such situation, it is not clear at all how the big-companies are losing the war for talent:

If he's ever searched for A-players, especially those who didn't make big money in the bubble, he should know that that fight isn't easy.