[lumost]

That just means you’re pulling from the lower end of the talent pool. There is nothing wrong with this, but usually talent is correlated with outcome. Most hot startups which are going places are near impossible to get into even for folks with good offers.

[tgma]

Your last sentence is not mutually exclusive with my statement. Both could be simultaneously true. The sheer number of big company employees compared to hot startup makes it hard for everyone good to get into the startup, especially considering they usually have more specific needs. That said it could also be the case that the hot startup cannot easily get good employees from big company.

My point was more that the high end ones they do get are usually in the front piece of the airplane in the acquisition split. Also, the really hot startups are actually paying quite a bit of cash upfront so the original premise of employee sacrifice isn’t as true.