It definitely ruined a friendship of mine. His startup was making insane amounts of money. He offered me a position, then his business priorities changed and forced me into a poor role with no long term prospects. I struggled in that new role and he noticed that. He then terminated our agreement two months early.
There are reasons he's right about what he did and there are reasons I'm right about being upset about it but it definitely cost us our friendship.
I think back that if he had operated with integrity and honored his agreement to keep me on for two extra months it would have not been upsetting to leave then. As it was it left me scrambling with three small kids.
The lesson to me is that even if the startup is flush with cash, there will be issues. How the founder manages those issues matters.
I recall when I had my startup I did a bunch of business coaching and really had to take on a lot of uncomfortable things about myself. I'm grateful for that. I invited him many times to participate in that work and he never did. When the money is good you think you don't need it.
On one side you were a employee, so he needs to treat you kinda like a regular employee. If what he did to you would be normal for another employee, then he has a point. Doing different could even be seem as unfair for the other employees.
On the other side you are a friend, I really don't know what he could have done differently, very hard.
It's wild that you said that amount because that was exactly the number.
I have other friendships that have been tested for similar amounts that have survived. But, it leaves a mark.
I had an ex-employee who worked for me under starvation wages in a startup long ago. He was upset about that and some tax implications, and brought it up with me. I gave him a smallish lump sum and enabled him to put a down payment on a house. I need to ask him about that, it was really brave to ask me to clean something up, and I never did that with the friend from the OP. I wonder if it would have gone differently.
I'm seeing a lot of people in my circle struggling right now. I bet 2024 is going to be a bad year for friendships.
This forum is so out of touch with reality sometimes I'm just left blinking and shaking my head. 20,000 dollars is an enormous amount of money to a supermajority of people in the developed world. Almost half an annual wage for most industrial workers in the EU and US.
I probably could have phrased it better, but my comment was taken out of context. What I mean is $20k is a paltry sum for a tech startup to screw someone over for. I don’t think it’s a small sum for most individual wage earners (especially with young children).
Really? Try glancing the sorts of wages and earnings that literally 99% of the world's population makes on downwards and you'll quickly see that it's far, far from "paltry" for the vast majority of people.
I'm unsure why my sibling comments seem to think the sentence ends at "sum".
Is it possible to buy a real friendship for $20k? Is a friendship of many years worth more to you than $20k - would you stop being friends if someone else offered you that much to do so?
This isn't a paltry sum of money, it is a paltry sum to end a friendship over.
An interesting thought experiment to me is how much I would be willing to spend to preserve a friendship. Various situations over the past few years, including some businesses with friends made me think about hypotheticals.
I was going to say "maybe to launch a rocket into space" but then I realized SpaceX has made even that much cheaper than it used to be. (Still more than 20K though :))
> Very few friendships are robust enough to survive one party costing the other $20,000.
That probably depends on how critical that $20k is to you. If it's your only $20k, then yeah it'd be much more impactful than if it's just one of many.
Certainly, if the loss means you encounter financial hardship, you'd be understandably resentful.
But even when the loss causes little financial hardship, it could put a strain on a relationship.
Imagine you invest $20k in my business and I buy a $5k industrial juicing machine for the office so my staff can have freshly squeezed orange juice. I tell you that employees expect free luxury food these days and it'll make hiring much easier. You have your doubts.
If the business does well and we both make a big profit - we're both happy. You still think the juicer was a bit extravagant - but it all worked out in the end, and maybe I was right that it helped with recruitment.
But if the business fails - you might resent the fact I wasted $5k of your money on a juicer.
When we started working together I suggested a six month trial, and he said let's do 12 months. That role was perfect and I had the skills for it. 6 months in his business priorities changed, so he pushed me into a new role. Then, at the ten month mark said "I just don't have any more work for you."
It all depends on what is a friend. Your statement makes me question what makes a good friend. I don't really know right now. It is a lot harder to make them at 50, of that I'm sure.
I've seen friendships break down over one person not doing the dishes for a prolonged period.
The issue with friendships is usually there's some expectation of being in it 'together' and to put in some sort of similar effort, despite the major power imbalance of employee vs. cofounder.
If the founder feels their friend is for instance, giving say half the effort they are (which I feel personally is reasonable for an early stage employee, that they have a life), they may feel their friend is violating some notion of trust, despite the friend getting maybe 1% equity at best.
There are reasons he's right about what he did and there are reasons I'm right about being upset about it but it definitely cost us our friendship.
I think back that if he had operated with integrity and honored his agreement to keep me on for two extra months it would have not been upsetting to leave then. As it was it left me scrambling with three small kids.
The lesson to me is that even if the startup is flush with cash, there will be issues. How the founder manages those issues matters.
I recall when I had my startup I did a bunch of business coaching and really had to take on a lot of uncomfortable things about myself. I'm grateful for that. I invited him many times to participate in that work and he never did. When the money is good you think you don't need it.