Thoughts on PM offer
Company: Series B startup in SF Candidate: PM, 6yoe Role: PM for core product Offer: Base 154k Stock I believe doesn’t matter as much for round B startup Questions: 1. How would you approach negotiating the offer? (I’ve never done that) 2. Is this legit? 3. Have you ever negotiated successfully and what were your levers? Thanks!
You can take it but keep interviewing. Not much other way to increase comp than getting multiple offers
Don't focus on base for Series B. Can help if you can provide this. Which company? Can't comment on legit or not without that. If you can't name it, give some standard metrics such as 1. If Enterprise SaaS then what's the ARR, valuation, etc. 2. If consumer SaaS, then geography, rev model, penetration, TAM, etc. Other info such as: Your employee#, your role, etc.
It’s a marketplace targeting small businesses. 100k customers, tam 30million, subscription. ~60 people. Mostly in states. My bet is that with company growth it can be possible to get into product director position in 1-2y. But the offer seems low tbh, not sure about the best approach to negotiate. I’m interviewing at 4 other companies, but not sure if I get the offer soon enough.
Best way to negotiate is equity. Try to get at least 0.1-0.15%, depends on who is backing them. On base, the way to think about is ...as long as you have a 2 yr runway with mortgage and car payments between you and your significant other, you're good and can consider base secondary. Think like an owner of a high growth company on this one!
Where was your 6 YOE? Not all experience is equal. If it was in other small unknown companies working on products with low revenue/users, this may be a real offer and you're just - unfortunately - haven't got a real valuable experience yet. If you worked on known products, with reputation of having strong eng teams, real user/revenue impact, than this offer is way too low
Mostly startups, I’ve always thought this experience is more valuable for a pm, much better than working on login only for years at Fb.
Practically I agree, and I started the same way. But unfortunately, there is something unique when you work on products that decisions have serious conferences and demonstrate tell impact that is hard to show with start up experience
I think the base is within range but more on the low end. You should definitely work out the potential upside of your equity (but definitely be prepare that it can worth nothing) I don't think the pay at a series b would ever be competitive to FAANG, so it really depends on what you are looking for in this stage of your career
Low
What do you think is ok?
Startups only pays base with no bonus and rsu. Equity, sure it counts but not until it goes IPO and also that will get diluted as more investors comes in. which means base is the only thing you can work with. Dont think you can survice with 154k cash a year in SF. Also you have 6 YOE so you should get more. This is more of a Recent College grad salary