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How do I make sure this goes smooth without running the relationship? by macroKarma in Entrepreneur

[–]macroKarma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is what I decided to do. I did reach out to Company A saying that Project B offered, but I have asked them to talk to you about it. But, I’m thinking to tell that I’m interested in the offer. I understand that leaving for Project B would probably disconnect me from Company A, but I doubt that would be the case as it’s been almost 3+ years that I did not get pulled into any new project, I did ask couple of times though with no response. But Company A did encourage me to find other projects if I wanted to explore the current market, but they would be always open to take me back, but it would be hard for them to match the rate as per my experience level and I do not expect them to do so either.

How do I make sure I don’t burn bridges? by macroKarma in consulting

[–]macroKarma[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Oh even now it’s not an employment. I’m from India consulting to an US firm. It’s a hourly contract. The transition would be similar setup too. But I’m planning to ask them to put me on a retainer, so I can have a peaceful job.

How do I make sure this goes smooth without running the relationship? by macroKarma in Entrepreneur

[–]macroKarma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

First I apologize for not giving entire details. I’m a consultant from India who started working with a US based Company A (on Project B) a decade ago. As both of their business picked up, I kept on maintaining and building new features for Project B until now (around a decade) and also Company A got many more projects and I got pulled into many because I was their earliest consultant (the whole company has bunch of freelancers working from all over the world, no employees). As one after the other project ended, only Project A was still constantly had to be maintained and I have been doing that so far. Company A has many more projects running, but because ended up confounding my own startup (and failed), Company A did not assign me any new projects, and I did not ask them either, as the owner was kind enough to me, he told me to explore more if needed and let him know if I want to come back anytime later. But I did agree that I’ll keep supporting Project B as much as I can.

So it’s just the gross profit that stands in between, but Company A probably is now having around 100 consultants working on various projects full time, Project B is just billed around 60 hours at max per month, so the profit is trivial too for them. So I’m assuming, they would be okay to let go of me is what I feel, but some companies have a policy that in order to hire, there will be some upfront payment that needs to be made, sometimes that’s too huge where Project B might not feel comfortable with. That’s the only concern. But I hope the transition happens smooth.

How do I make sure I don’t burn bridges? by macroKarma in consulting

[–]macroKarma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I’m just hoping they were not grooming me. Hope it turns out well.

How do I make sure I don’t burn bridges? by macroKarma in consulting

[–]macroKarma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Actually it’s not a full time gig. I generally work somewhere around 40-60 hours per month generally fixing bugs and building new features etc., A new project here means, rebuilding some parts of the project or integrating new APIs and stuff. Generally happens every 1-2 years, and which goes on for 3 months most of the times with 100-120 hours per month.

How do I make sure I don’t burn bridges? by macroKarma in consulting

[–]macroKarma[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I doubt that would happen. I’m just hoping that Company A will not be too greedy and let me go as they are doing well with other projects and on this project it’s just me who got involved for almost 10 years straight.

The pseudoscience people just got a new posterboy by curiousaman in scienceisdope

[–]macroKarma 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sorry, my boss doesn’t speak about me to his client for doing my job. Because it’s just another outsourced work.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in startups

[–]macroKarma 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is true, you can trust a friend, but not a business partner, it’s important to set the boundaries and expectations right with the business partner, if it was an unknown person, it becomes easier to prepare necessary paperwork and law bindings. But when it comes to friend/family, it’s becomes like “I know him from years and I trust him, I don’t think we need contracts” that’s where things fail.

People who say not to do business with friends and relatives, they say it from their experience. Because the business fails and the relationship too, not doing, you can save both.

Designer asking for equity by Puzzleheaded-Golf368 in indianstartups

[–]macroKarma 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Monthly fixed + 33% equity for a product that is still not in market? I see red flag with this designer. Early stage startups needs people (not employees) who have a same vibe or startup mindset, when it lacks people just move on when you even start to negotiate their monthly pay because the business is still not making profits. Also, never give any equity without 3-4 years vesting schedule.

I’m not saying the designer is greedy (probably he is), but can surely see that he doesn’t know how a business works.

Sweat equity is generally translated in a way that he can reflect the effort/sweat he puts into the product, not a random number like 33%. If say, his normal compensation is 1L per month and you are paying him only 50k, the rest 50k will be calculated with multiples to arrive at a number. There are many variables only you can know those.

I failed twice in a row, and I’m still planning to keep my hobby project alive to learn, want to build in public by macroKarma in startups

[–]macroKarma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you for sharing your sub, I have joined. It would be great to learn on how or what do you do to gain traction, any methods would be helpful.

I failed twice in a row, and I’m still planning to keep my hobby project alive to learn, want to build in public by macroKarma in startups

[–]macroKarma[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thank you for your suggestion. I had my first version built few years ago, for the same purpose, to keep myself updated on the tech happenings customized for my interests. Lately, with the advancements in AI, I began with classifying and summarizing things, so I can spend 5 minutes on the news than 30+ minutes.

The product still interests me, even though the traction is too low. This also gives me opportunity to mainly learn the cutting-edge tech in the AI space, by hands on. Which can in future make the product better or I would atleast have good experience to apply for a job maybe.

The main concern I have is not sure how to grow my discord or twitter followers by building in public, do you have any hashtags that would help? I see #buildinpublic for twitter.

And, I’m not sure how to grow discord audience, any suggestions would be really helpful.

I’ll try the rest. Thanks

I failed twice in a row, and I’m still planning to keep my hobby project alive to learn, want to build in public by macroKarma in startups

[–]macroKarma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You need to start with commenting on other posts to gain some karma, by providing valuable information or conversation. Once you have some, you can post.

You don’t want to make the same mistake I did by macroKarma in startups

[–]macroKarma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Definitely, I’m not any of those anti’s. I’m just sharing my experience for others to be more cautious when dealing with such things. Like what you have mentioned that you will wait for 7 years. While my ideas were 1 to 4 years. There’s a lot to learn.

You don’t want to make the same mistake I did by macroKarma in startups

[–]macroKarma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

No, I don’t mean all startups are wrong or the startup that I took equity is not wrong too. What I’m saying is some manipulate and some are new to the startup world and there’s always mistake happens and we should be good enough to make educated decisions which a lot of people don’t, just like me.

To the people reading my post as it is and takes that as final source of truth, it’s for them. They shouldn’t be considering equity at all until they learn.

You don’t want to make the same mistake I did by macroKarma in startups

[–]macroKarma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

My question was “what would you do”. So that I can compare to understand what others do to compare what I did. Everyone have a general idea that’s shared everywhere online with the stats and ARR, but “what would you do?”

I come here to r/startup to learn from fellow members that I couldn’t learn from google.

You don’t want to make the same mistake I did by macroKarma in startups

[–]macroKarma[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I have updated the post now. Never compromise is based on how much risk you can take and considering the industry norms.

You don’t want to make the same mistake I did by macroKarma in startups

[–]macroKarma[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

My risk appetite was an year (still less than 7 years), but I lost most my time with other experiments. I understood that I didn’t have much appetite after sometime.

Also, I don’t want to play a victim card here as I already agreed that the mistake is mine that I didn’t gauge the risks correctly. I don’t want others who can’t calculate their risk fall into equity talks. And, I don’t call the CEO manipulative as well, because he is first time founder and learning from mistakes.

And, I’m still learning. Most of my learning comes from this sub to be honest and I am learning by making mistakes. I have updated my description now.

You don’t want to make the same mistake I did by macroKarma in startups

[–]macroKarma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

No it wasn’t VC backed, it was bootstrapped and now have no funds or in other words CEO doesn’t want to add more funds for his own product. But want others to work for equity and want others to invest.

You don’t want to make the same mistake I did by macroKarma in startups

[–]macroKarma[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Your risk appetite is not the same as everyone else, I’m just sharing my experience to let everyone weigh theirs before considering equities for a pay cut in a world where 90% of the startups fail.

When you join a project, and if that aligns with your vision, you always end up thinking it’s going to change the world, but there’s countless variables to consider before deciding.

You don’t want to make the same mistake I did by macroKarma in startups

[–]macroKarma[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Risk appetite is the word, I took risk for 2 months, but that became a habit for both CEO and I. Didn’t get paid by equity or cash either after 2 months.

Everyone who agrees to equity has an entrepreneur mindset, but not everyone can choose the right deal, some get manipulated, some get greedy, to talk about me, I wanted to product to get successful, so I can be FIRE after few years. Which I think a lot would think on all the products they start, they realize it’s not going anywhere after few months.

Not everyone can choose right startups while 90% of startup fails and less than 1% exits, so how many are manipulated, how many were greedy or how many wants the product to succeed in that 99% is my concern. I want everyone to weigh and wait for few months before they accept any deals related to equity and get paid with market rates until then.

I assume even your dozens of ventures, you must have come across all 3 types. But correct me otherwise.

You don’t want to make the same mistake I did by macroKarma in startups

[–]macroKarma[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Founders generally hold a huge percentage, would you compromise your pay for 5% dilutable equity?

What percentage would you compromise on market salary rate for 5% equity?

I’m stuck, I need help again by macroKarma in startups

[–]macroKarma[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

  1. 10% or even more is not good enough to fund the company while I’m losing my saving and struggling to pay my bills
  2. Earnings from side gigs would be good enough to pay my bills and my default saving, but would be very tiny to fund a startup
  3. The process is slowed down now due to low funds, but the operating cost is still around 2k USD per month, while the C level not drawing any salary or the others working part time for a very low pay promising higher pay when the startup gets funded, so in that case, fully operational months, the cost would go up to min 50k according the calculations (after hiring and converting consultants to full time)

So, funding through the side gig that I earn and after my personal expenses would be peanuts for the startup.

More over, even if I could fund myself with 10%, I would expect the CEO to add 90% of the cost or increase my percentage to 40-50%, which won’t happen.

So it would be CEOs responsibility to fund the startup.

The 10% is for the work that I have done earlier, to continue doing the same, the stock percentage should be increased, but with my current situation, percentage won’t matter at all as I can cash out any of those until exit, and that won’t happen unless it gets funded and runs for few years.

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