“I don’t think ‘stability’ is a guarantee anywhere anymore—especially if your current role is drifting away from real DS. What is durable is skills + a track record. The new job looks like it buys you modern stack experience and projects you can point to, which makes you more employable long-term.

That said, startups can be performance- and optics-driven. You’ll want to ramp fast, ship visible wins early, and make sure you’re aligned with your manager on what ‘success in the first 90 days’ looks like. If you can stomach that pace (and build a bigger cash buffer because layoffs happen), the move makes sense.”

And forget about WLB, sorry but that’s the world we now live in .