A former boss wanted me to come work for his new company so badly that he offered me 140k and what would be worth around 2mm(140k in today's value) in stock options when the company was worth 8x it's current value. It's a 1bn dollar company, and last year in January it was worth maybe 250mm, so 8x is not unreasonable. The thing is I don't like betting on an 8x increase, so I considered only the 2x increase(maybe about 440kish) when looking at the offer.
I know people who work at this company, and the hours there are terrible. One of my friends has been there since it began, and he works all day, then goes home, eats dinner, and works till 1am. It's a terrible dichotomy: There are 30 engineers, and if you look at the codebase, only 5 or 6 of them have ever really contributed(my friend is one). He is suffering from depression now, and has a 1000 yard stare in his eyes. He'll be a millionaire once they IPO, though, for sure.
My current gig is 100% remote work, 140k, and 120k in options in a much smaller startup that *might* be worth 10mm at the end of this year, which would bring my options value up to 260k if I vested over 4 years. Really not even financially on the same page.
And yet I still told this man no to his face. I can't believe it. Something just didn't feel right, and now I'm in shock. I told him the offer wasn't a no-brainer, and that it'd needed to be a no-brainer for me to switch. This is because I knew I was guaranteed going to be miserable for four years, so it had to be the last four years I ever worked. It wasn't guaranteed, and I'm happy right now where I'm at, even though I may not have a job in six months.
Am I crazy for doing this? I am not sure yet.