re: Working for a Start Up. Who has experience with it?

I have a worked at a startup in the looking for Series A financing for about a year and have worked on the VC side of things as well.

From a "joining the team" perspective, we find the most successful companies to be those with VERY experienced management teams. We are talking about multiple years of experience on a variety of levels (both within the industry as well as the IT/Software perspectives as everything is becoming more and more integrated with software/apps/etc). Secondly, I would make sure that your management team is dedicated, in that they have one job and this isn't their side gig. When things get rough, some entreprenuers tend to leave one gig and go to another, and you don't want to be caught the only full time employee in an empty startup.

Additionally, i'd get feedback from current customers or people in the industry before joining a current startup. Something that might seem "cool" could be impossible to sell to your target customer, so i'd be sure that your product solves a pain point for your consumer.

Lastly, i'd make sure that the company has a great group of advisors from your space. More specifically i'd like to see someone in the advisory capacity that is a target customer to be your "opinion leader" on the product to help market it. This does a great deal of good from a credibility standpoint.

Lastly lastly, be sure that the C-Suite has skin in the game other than sweat equity. "Buying in" makes you work harder to succeed and will help when you need to work nights and weekends while your friends are out partying.

I am a 100% advocate for starting your own business. There is really nothing quite like those highs and lows.