This is pretty typical of my experience. I was offered 0.1% at my first startup (angel-funded, about 4 months old, I was straight out of high school, think I was employee #13 but the first 6 or so employees were from an earlier bootstrapped incarnation of the company and were no longer there). 0.022% at a startup I interviewed with just out of college (series A coming up on a series B, about a year and a half old, employee #22). No equity at the startup I ended up taking a job with - companies that intend to remain private forever are often very stingy in giving away stock.

It's pretty typical to have health benefits but no 401k. You should be getting roughly market-rate compensation at a funded startup though; that's why they have funding. If you want big stock grants, you need to take big risks, i.e. work for little or no salary.

Edit: One more thing that I want to add since I've seen many friends get burned or disillusioned by this: you should assume that the only thing you'll get out of a startup is the cash you're paid and the experience of having worked there. Very few early employees cash out with enough that they never have to work again: the ones I know all fall into 3 categories:

1.) They founded the company.

2.) The company went public and became a household name.

3.) They joined early and rose really high, i.e. VP level.

The vast majority of early startup employees don't fit these categories: either their company is acquired in the $40M range and they end up with $3K (true story), or their equity is diluted by multiple successive funding rounds so that they end up owning a tiny fraction of their initial equity stake (also a true story), or the company goes bust and their equity is worth nothing (yeah, that's me). If you go in expecting a job where you'll learn things and hopefully build something cool, then any massive payday is just gravy. If you go in expecting a massive payday, you'll probably be disappointed.

Thank you very much for your remarks. It looks like I am in a typical ballpark as far as the equity compensation goes, maybe slightly above average. And I am definitively planning to continue to work after this. :) But I also hope in "some" payday, otherwise I wouldn't be taking any stocks.

I could get market rate salary with less stock, but I think I am going with a below-market salary and more stocks. About that, I am still trying to decide the right balance...

Financially, you're almost always better off taking more cash and less stock. In the average startup, things do not go well, so a raise in 8 months may not really be in the cards (and if things are going well, your equity will be worth much more than your salary anyway).

But there are intangible benefits to taking more equity and less salary. You work harder, which means that you get to work on more interesting things, which opens up more doors in the future. If I were to take a job now (and I'm looking :-)), I'd probably go for more equity and a lower salary as long as it's adequate to cover basic living costs, if only because there're only so many material comforts that one needs...

> In the average startup, things do not go well

At one point, I had something like 10K Linuxcare options, when VA Linux and Redhat had recently had huge IPO's and were trading well north of $100. Sigh...

It's not something I think about much though. I was paid well and got a lot of other things out of the experience. However...yeah, it's pretty easy for things to turn sour in a hurry.

If that is all you guys are getting, start your own company or expect to earn cash doing consulting.

Just do the math, if you get 0.3% if a company, then they do two or three more round devaluing you, you're at 0.1% at best. How much does the company have to sell for you to see a windfall which is more than 1x your annual salary? a LOT. They basically have to public.

Being a second or third tier hire is a bad place to be. Not enough salary to make it worth it, not enough stock to have a windfall (unless you do ipo which isn't happening a lot right now), and huge hours as if you were a co-founder / first employee.

Depends where the company is in its lifetime.

Basically, it sucks to be an early employee in a startup that does not yet have traction ("product/market fit", in Marc Andreesen's words). You take on most of the risk of a founder yet have nowhere near the reward. And the hours are often founder-like as well, since the company often has no clue what it's doing and so you just keep doing everything until something works or you run out of money. And if you do run out of money (pretty likely), nobody knows or cares about what you did, which can hurt you in your future career.

Being an early employee in a startup with traction can be a very nice place to be, though. Many people underestimate both the chances of success once traction's been achieved (high, even if you're not yet profitable) and the potential market size. And you don't have to put up with the uncertainty and risk that the founders did. Most startups with traction don't get sold for $10-50M that's common for a startup with a product and a couple customers, they get sold for $200M+ or they go public for $5B+.

There are huge variations depending on your expertise and any unique skill sets, title, etc.

At a startup that has received a first round of funding from a top tier VC, a VP could expect something in the 1.5% to 3% range (more for marketing & technical people, average for product and business, less for finance and support). Directors might get between 0.5% to 1.0%. Manager levels half that with technical and marketing people higher in the range, product in the middle and everyone else lower. More for earlier in the product lifecycle (pre-prototype, pre-funding, pre-launch, etc.).

I should have said this in my post. I'm going to join as a Sr. software engineer. I have around 8 years of experience and a MSEE. I wouldn't say my skill set is unique, honestly, especially here in Silicon Valley.

The product is in stealth so I can't disclose anything about it.

thats about average. if you're not a ridiculously important, irreplaceable employee, don't expect more than 1%.

It's fairly typical, but I'm used to seeing at least a 401K with no match. Most startups I have worked for at this stage started exploring HR Benefits companies and generally the benefits improve slightly.

My advice is not to buy up the stock by taking less cash at that stage. .15% probably won't justify it.

There's a planned salary increase up to market rate in 8 months from now (if things go well of course). That's also why I am considering more stocks now. If I start with a market rate salary now, I won't be getting any pay increase later.

Ah. In that case, buy them up. I've seen planned increases to market rate go awry, but if you're comfortable that it'll be delivered, it can't hurt to forgo 8 months for another .15%.

If your account is an anonymous account, can you disclose how much cash you were offered? Or an approximate amount. It makes it easier to evaluate the entire offer.

The no 401K is a fairly big deal.

Here in the UK, for high rate tax payers, a matching pension is worth a bit more than 140% of the stated value. So for an $80k job a 5% matching pension is worth nearly $6k a year.

That's equal to a 0.1% stake in a $60m company, with better certainty of growth. So over five years it might match half a percent stake depending on your appetite for risk.