Leave Uber for startup
I’ve been at Uber my entire working life, currently Sr. Staff backend engineer with 8 YOE. I’m very comfortable here, feel respected, know how to work effectively in this environment, great WLB. But it is getting stale. The projects that leadership is excited for me to work on are very far from the building & shipping that initially propelled my career growth. More about instituting bureaucratic processes, taking inventories, measuring SLAs, designing trainings. The view from middle management has never interested me. The products and systems I still do real work on, meanwhile, are undergoing a lot of churn in stakeholders and changes in direction, neither of which I’m particularly into. The wind is blowing in a direction that undermines a lot of what I’ve done over the last few years. This job pays beyond my wildest dreams. $1m/year in each of the last 2. $1.25m in liquid savings currently; if I keep adding $300k/yr to the pile I could be financially independent within 5 years. But I can also see myself getting complacent, skills atrophying, and passion almost completely gone by that time. Recently several former colleagues I respect have approached me about AI startups. One seed stage, one series B. Part of me thinks it would be crazy to give up such an incredibly lucky position; all I have to do is not fuck it up, delay gratification a bit longer, and I’d be free. This position is because of some incredibly fortunate right-place-right-time situations and people who believed in me; I won’t stumble into it again. Probably my position will move to India or Brazil if I vacate it. But part of me is tempted. What is Silicon Valley about if not building something new with your friends? Plus, I’m 29 now; when I’m in my 30s with young kids will not be a good time for startup life either. And while I don’t have FI (or a house) I do clearly have a solid foundation to take some risk. If I’m supposedly so good at this, shouldn’t I be working on something deeper and higher stakes? Can Google Sheets really be the highest and best use of my life?
If I read the hints about your age correctly, you should be able to reinvent yourself after 5 years of stagnation. It may be your last chance to become financially independent.
Don’t.
Damn sr staff as a 29yo! Prodigy or is that normal? I am a mere SEIII with 8YOE! Usually takes 3-5 years to get from SEIII to senior at my company so I dont even know how would one get to this level that fast, I mean the principal engineer which I would consider may be is the same similar level at EA is impossible to attain, we only have few of those and these are sort of people with 30 patents 20 published books! Literally responsible for creating multiple algorithms that are game industry standards. I got no advice I am just so much in awe!
Yeah I'm 35, 7 yoe, just a swe, late to this faangmula game. But they say, every one time frame is different, just look at Obama and Trump, one retires at less than 60 years, the other? lol
I dont care about faang 🤷🏽♂️ I was just talking about the position and the impact one would have to make to get there in such a short time and how amazing one needs to be to be making that much impact back to back. Also these are not the levels everyone reaches, only a selective few anyways so getting there is impressive and in that short time is even more impressive.
AI startups are a fad that is not sustainable, be financially independent where you are and then deal with your mid life crisis.
Stay at your current role until you're FI. Then you can cofound a startup and raise VC. Your significant upward trajectory at Uber will paint a crystal clear narrative of your ability to solve real business problems at a well known tech company. If I were you, I'd funnel that boredom and curiosity into getting to know your colleagues at Uber better and working horizontally. Try and get a sense of what your product organization is doing. You probably can start connecting to leadership and getting a sense of what their 2-3 year strategic vision is. If you can come up with a way to create value that others are missing, you're senior enough in the organization that you can probably convince the right people to give you a mandate to "choose your own adventure" while there. If you do want to work at a startup eventually (whether an existing one, or one you may cofound), the muscle you'll develop through this process will serve you well. Even if it doesn't go as planned, it will give you a great inventory of your growth areas that you'll need to work on to move forward in your career. Good luck. Make sure to appreciate what you have and get creative about how to translate it into what you want.
Do it
turn it into a poll!
I would continue this job until I land on a golden startup opportunity. That opportunity would be one that you won't regret. In the meantime, just keep doing the good work.