What It Takes to Be The 4th Employee of a Unicorn Startup | Jina Kim (1/2)

September 10th, I was leaving work around 4.30 and that tomorrow never came because the building class. And then I began to have like nightmares about what would have happened to me if I was in that building. I thought about how important life is and it's all about carpetian because tomorrow never, my never come.

9月10日，下午4点半左右，我刚要离开工作，但由于建筑类的活动，第二天就没来了。然后，我开始做噩梦，想象着如果我在那栋大楼里会发生什么事情。我意识到生命是多么重要，因为明天也许永远不会来。

And ultimately that decision was made when lemon brothers went bankrupt because I realized I spent my whole entire 20s creating these toxic securities and that's when I realized okay I need to do something good for the world.

最终，柠檬兄弟破产了，我意识到我的整个20岁都在创造这些有毒的证券，于是我意识到我需要为世界做些好事。

Finally in 2013 I cleaned my job, drive across the country to get a job in Silicon Valley. My name is Gina Kim and I worked in Silicon Valley for about 10 years. Part to that I was a Java programmer and investment banker and lemon brothers.

最终，在2013年，我清理了自己的工作，驾车穿越整个国家，去了硅谷找工作。我的名字是吉娜·金，我在硅谷工作了大约10年。其中一部分时间，我是一名Java程序员和投资银行家，在柠檬兄弟公司工作。

What I focused on is helping startups grow in terms of customer journey and go-to-market strategy and helping them also with just growing their customers. So I started my career as a Java programmer at lemon brothers in 2000. From there I moved to the banking side in 2005 when there was a huge real estate boom in the US at first.

我关注的是帮助初创企业在顾客旅程和营销策略方面成长，并帮助它们扩大客户规模。所以，我在2000年开始在Lemon Brothers担任Java程序员。从那时起，我逐渐转到银行业，在2005年美国房地产市场首次出现繁荣时开始从事这一领域。

That seems really exciting. They give you six-figure salary. They take you out to this amazing event. You go to basketball games and they have a private room for you, etc. But I think that the excitement kind of wears off.

这听起来非常令人兴奋。他们给你六位数的薪水。他们带你参加惊人的活动。你可以去看篮球比赛，他们为你私人包间，等等。但我觉得这种兴奋感有点消退了。

First thing in the morning I would come in, I would review the mortgage loans, then I would just create this financial model and create a presentation for the senior bankers and then they are the ones that are making decision. Nobody is telling me okay Gina what do you think about improving the process? No one is asking for my opinion. All basically my focus is not making a mistake when I'm entering information about the loans.

早上第一件事我会来到，我会回顾抵押贷款，然后我只是创建这个财务模型并为高级银行家创建演示文稿，然后他们就是决策者。没人告诉我，吉娜，你认为改进流程怎么样？没有人问我的意见。基本上，我的重点不是在输入贷款信息时犯错。

Yeah so September 10th I was leaving work around 4.30. My manager at the time saw me leaving and he said where are you going? Do you think this is half day? He was joking. We had a very good relationship and I told him it's okay I'll finish the work tomorrow and that tomorrow never came because the building class and at the time I was working on 4 years 4. And then I began to have nightmares about what would have happened to me if I was in that building.

9月10日，我大约在下午4点半下班了。当时我的经理看到我要离开，他开玩笑地问我要去哪里。难道你认为今天是半天吗？我们的关系非常好，我告诉他没事，我第二天会完成工作的。但是从那一天起，我再也没能完成工作，因为楼房塌了。当时我在4年4班工作，开始彻夜不眠，担心自己如果在那栋楼里会发生什么。

I thought about how important life is and it's all about carpeting because tomorrow never my never come.

我想到了生命的重要性，它关乎整个人生，因为明天也许永远不会到来。

So in 2008 one of my co-workers decided to quit and this was like even before the whole bubble popped. I asked him you know why do you want to quit and he said I'm actually starting a company with one of my co-founders. His name was John Zimmer and he's the CEO of Lyft. So when John told me about that, the first I was really shocked because John to me was really a quiet guy or he didn't seem like someone who would make that kind of dramatic decision.

在2008年，我的一个同事决定辞职，甚至在整个泡沫破裂之前就离开了。我问他，你知道为什么想辞职吗？他说他其实正在和一个联合创始人开一家公司。他的名字叫约翰·齐默，他是Lyft的CEO。当约翰告诉我这个消息时，我非常震惊，因为在我看来，约翰是一个很安静的人，或者说他不像是会做出这样戏剧性决定的人。

The second thing was that at the time Lehman Brothers was still a great job to have. I just didn't understand why he would just give up all that. Later also I heard at the interview that he used to actually drive to Cornell every weekend to talk to students about trying out his startup and ultimately that decision was made when Lehman Brothers went bankrupt because I realized I spent my whole entire 20s creating these toxic securities and investigators actually called me and said can you testify at the court for Lehman Brothers creditors and that's when I realized okay I need to do something good for the world.

第二个事情是，在那个时候，拥有雷曼兄弟的工作还是非常好的。我只是不理解他为什么要放弃所有这些。后来我在面试中听到，他曾经每个周末开车去康奈尔大学跟学生们谈论他的创业公司。最终，雷曼兄弟破产了，他做出了这个决定。因为我意识到自己已经用整整20年的时间创造了这些有害的证券，调查人员甚至给我打电话说：“你能在雷曼兄弟债权人的法庭上作证吗？”这时我意识到，我需要为世界做点好事。

Finally in 2013 I grew my job at the time I was 34 and I drove across the country to get a job in Silicon Valley. The first thing I did was look at co-working spaces because I knew that that's where I could network and mingle with engineers. I found this one in Mountain View called Hacker Dojo. I rented a desk there and literally I took my laptop and I just sat next to engineers and just talked to them and they told me about this website called Angelist a lot of the people that want to get into startups they'll look at job postings there.

最后在2013年，我扩展了我当时的工作，当时我34岁，开车穿过全国去了硅谷找工作。我做的第一件事是看共用工作空间，因为我知道那是我可以与工程师交流和交际的地方。我发现在山景城有一个叫做Hacker Dojo的地方。我在那里租了一个桌子，而且我就坐在工程师旁边，和他们聊天，他们告诉我一个叫做Angelist的网站，很多想加入初创公司的人都会在那里看工作职位。

I honestly thought I would get job at like Facebook or Google or something like that. I looked for a job for about six months because a lot of the company didn't want to hire someone from Wall Street or Lehman Brothers so in a way my career in Lehman Brothers was almost like a scarlet letter so literally what a day was on Angelist I looked up any jobs that are related to finance and technology.

我当时真的以为我会在像Facebook或Google这样的公司找到工作。我找工作大概六个月了，因为很多公司不想雇用来自华尔街或雷曼兄弟的人，所以从某种意义上来说，我在雷曼兄弟的职业几乎像个绯红字，所以每天我都会在Angelist上查找任何与财务和技术相关的工作。

Yeah that's where I found E-Share's or Carter. E-Share's, Carter, what they do is they allow you companies to issue electronic securities to their investors or their employees in the private market. What Henry told me about what E-Share is about I realized that this is a very big problem and it's an interesting problem to solve. Before Carter all of this information about the stocks and stock options that was all taken care of by law firms. Now law firms are very expensive lawyers are expensive.

“是啊，我在那里发现了E-Share和Carter。E-Share和Carter的业务是允许公司在私人市场向其投资者或员工发行电子证券。亨利告诉我E-Share的情况，我认识到这是一个非常大的问题，也是一个有趣的问题需要解决。在Carter之前，有关股票和股票期权的所有信息都由律师事务所处理。现在律师事务所非常昂贵，律师也很贵。”

A lot of founders before they raised money they would try to do it themselves so they would keep the information about who owns what in a self-subscibe. There was really no job posting for operations person. There was only a job posting for engineers but I figured why not let me let me see if they're looking for someone like me.

许多创始人在筹集资金之前会尝试自己解决，这样他们就可以保留所有者信息在自己的订阅中。当时没有运营人员的招聘信息，只有工程师的职位发布，但我想为什么不让我去看看他们是否在寻找像我这样的人呢。

And then finally in September Henry who was the CEO of Carter at the time he was called E-Share. He said sorry we already have an operations manager and then on Friday he reached out to me again and he said actually our operations manager quit today and I think it's so undipitous that you reached out to me this week so are you still interested in the job? And I said yes. So my very first task was really ordering lunches for everybody. So at the time I think we were using DoorDash and so figuring out how to use DoorDash to order lunches.

然后最终在九月，当时作为Carter的CEO，名叫E-Share的亨利表示很抱歉，我们已经有了一位运营经理。但是周五他再次联系了我，说事实上我们的运营经理今天已经辞职了，你这周联系我太巧了，你还对这个工作感兴趣吗？我说是的。所以，我的第一个任务就是为大家订午餐。当时我们使用DoorDash，所以要想办法使用DoorDash订购午餐。

I think that was the my first task and it was again like not really easy because I had to make sure that I ordered by 10.30 otherwise the lunch would not get there by 12 and then the engineers they would get cranky. For me actually it was really fun because Henry really trusted me from the beginning and all the things that he wanted me to take care of. He even payroll. He just gave me all the access from the beginning. I realized like wow I have all this responsibility and I have to figure it out.

我想那是我第一个任务，但不是很容易，必须确保在10:30之前下订单，否则午餐就到不了12点，唠叨的工程师会发脾气。 对我而言，这其实很有趣，因为从一开始亨利非常信任我，让我负责所有事情，甚至还包括工资单。 他从一开始就给了我所有权限。 我意识到自己有这么大的责任，必须理清思路。

For the first time since college I was actually like using my brain to solve problems and it was very exciting. I made a lot of mistakes as an operations manager so one thing I did was I was juggling a lot of things and I sent the wrong file to a customer and it was a very sensitive file and this was like around 6 p.m. and Henry he had already left and I made this mistake. I said oh no what am I going to do? I've only worked here for a month and now I'm going to be fired but I decided I'm going to call him anyway and then I told him the situation and he said oh that's fine just apologize and he said you know Gina you need to have thick skin to work at a startup. It's okay that you're going to make mistakes and I told trust you and that really changed me because you're going to make mistakes when you have good people that you work with they're not going to blame you for it. You're going to all work together to figure things out.

自大学以来，我第一次真正利用我的大脑去解决问题，感觉非常令人兴奋。作为一名业务经理，我犯了很多错误，其中一个就是在忙于多个任务时向客户发送了错误的文件，而这个文件非常敏感，当时大约是下午六点，亨利已经离开了，我犯了这个错误。我说：“不，我该怎么办？我才在这里工作了一个月，现在我要被解雇了。”但我决定还是给他打电话，然后告诉他现状，他说：“没关系，只要道歉就可以了。吉娜，你需要有足够的韧性才能在初创公司工作。犯错误不要紧，相信我。”这真的让我改变了，因为当你有优秀的同事时，你会犯错误，他们不会因此责怪你。你们会共同努力解决问题。

We had a very good team in the very beginning. We had very motivated employees who were not worried about failure and try things out because no one knows what's the right answer around February March of 2014. We did an interview with TechCrunch and we told them about how tap tables are broken. We're here to fix that problem and disrupt that space around the same time. There was an article about how 4.9a evaluations which was how stock options are valued. That space is also broken and once we got that momentum from the TechCrunch article we said okay this is a problem that we can also fix as well. So we started working on that 4.9a problem and then added that feature in as part of Carta and that really was the tipping point for us.

我们一开始就有一个非常好的团队。我们有非常有动力的员工，他们不担心失败，试着做事情，因为在2014年2月或3月左右，没有人知道什么是正确答案。我们接受了TechCrunch的采访，告诉他们Tap Tables出现了问题，我们在这里要解决这个问题，并在同一时间打破这个领域。关于4.9a评估，也就是股票期权估值的文章发布，该领域也出现了问题，一旦我们从TechCrunch的文章中获得了动力，我们说好的，这也是我们可以解决的问题。所以我们开始解决那个4.9a的问题，然后将该功能作为Carta的一部分添加进去，这确实是我们的转折点。

I also had that sort of imposter syndrome. I always felt like an imposter so because I come from a completely different background. I was an investment banker. I had no idea how startups worked and so as we grew we got all these amazing people to join. They have a lot of experience either on private markets or startups in general. When I started working with them again I just felt like okay do I really belong here anymore? Maybe my knowledge is not great.

我也曾经有过这种冒名顶替的感觉。我总觉得自己是个骗子，因为我来自完全不同的背景。我曾是一名投资银行家，对于初创公司的运作一无所知。随着我们的发展，我们吸引了很多经验丰富的人才加入。他们在私人市场或初创公司方面拥有丰富的经验。当我再次开始和他们一起工作时，我感到很迷茫，我真的还属于这里吗？也许我的知识水平不够好。

I think again you know you kind of have to have that thick skin realize that you have that unique insight and that unique insight is not something that anyone can take from you and so for me having that investment banking background it actually did help me also as I grew with Carta. In New York like at least like you know in Wall Street people focused on I think the present so like when you get a job offer right people don't care about the stock options they care about how much money that you're getting as of now but in Silicon Valley there's more emphasis on the future when you have your job offer you need to look at what your salary is going to be and how many stock options you're going to be getting if you really believe in that company you really need to exercise those stock options at Carta what I saw was a lot of people when they leave companies they end up not exercising their stock option and then they regret it if they don't tell you what percent of the company you were getting you should also ask that.

我认为你需要有那种坚韧不拔的意识，意识到你拥有独特的洞察力，而这种洞察力是任何人都无法夺走的。对我而言，拥有投资银行背景的经历确实帮助了我在与Carta一起成长的过程中。在纽约，至少在华尔街上，人们更关注当下，例如说当你收到工作机会时，人们并不关心你得到的股票期权，他们关心的是你当前获得了多少钱。但是在硅谷，更加强调未来。当你得到工作机会时，你需要考虑的是你的薪水以及你将获得多少股票期权。如果你真的相信这家公司，你需要行使这些股票期权。在Carta，我看到很多人离开公司后没有行使他们的股票期权，最终后悔。如果他们没有告诉你你会得到公司的百分之几，那么你也应该问清楚。

So when I moved from Wall Street to Silicon Valley my salary was cut in half and it was difficult but if that's again what you want to do then you do have to make that sacrifice since 2013 my stock option basically went up by 200 times for me that was the price of the risk that I took I'm really happy with the risk that I took and even if you fail there's going to be so much that you learn from it and there's so many other opportunities that are going to come to you in Silicon Valley crazy idea it's not really a crazy idea here everything is possible and so people accept that and that having that underlying assumption is so important and knowing that people are going to accept you as is back when Tesla started no one believed electronic cars can be possible now that I've been in Silicon Valley for 10 plus years what I realized is that success is something that I define it's not it's not about money it's about whether I am doing what I want to do.

当我从华尔街搬到硅谷时，我的薪水减少了一半，它很困难，但如果这是你想要做的事情，那么你必须做出这个牺牲。自2013年以来，我的股票期权基本上增长了200倍，对我来说，这就是我承担的风险的代价。我对我所承担的风险非常满意，即使你失败了，也会从中学到很多东西，并且还会有很多其他的机会在硅谷等待着你。在这里，疯狂的想法并不是真正的疯狂想法，一切都有可能，人们接受这一点，拥有这种基本的假设非常重要，知道人们会接受你的本来面目。当特斯拉开始时，没有人相信电动车是可能的，现在我在硅谷已经呆了10多年，我意识到成功是我定义的东西，与钱无关，而是关于我是否在做我想做的事情。

All this like very successful people Elon Musk or the Reid Hoffman who started like LinkedIn why are they still working like why are they still helping start up and investing and I think it's because like as we get older we have our own definition of success that has nothing to do with what the society tells us and it might change every year it might constantly evolve but unless we achieve that success like we're not going to be happy in life to me I'm going to I'm going to work till I die because this is what I enjoy and what is the meaning of life if you're not doing something that you enjoy.

像非常成功的人Elon Musk或创立LinkedIn的Reid Hoffman一样，他们为什么还在工作，为什么还在帮助初创企业和投资？我认为这是因为随着年龄的增长，我们对成功有了自己的定义，这与社会告诉我们的无关，它可能每年都会改变，可能会不断发展，但除非我们实现了成功，否则我们在生活中不会感到幸福。 对我来说，我会一直工作到死，因为这就是我喜欢的，如果你不做自己喜欢的事情，生命又有什么意义呢？

I feel like I was definitely lucky in terms of finding the job at Carter if I didn't actually decide to quit my job in Wall Street I wouldn't have found that luck right now using the experience that I had I'm helping out startups I am trying to start my own business as well and then continue to just focus primarily on helping startups become the next unicorn this is again like kind of like your next chapter in my life and maybe I'm not going to be successful doing this I might have to go back to working for another company or another business again I love the fact that I'm challenging myself to get to that another success and uh yeah that's that's pretty much it.

我觉得我在找到卡特公司的工作方面确实很幸运。如果我当时没有决定辞去在华尔街的工作，我现在就不会有那个运气了。凭借我的经验，我正在帮助初创公司，并尝试开展自己的业务，然后继续专注于帮助初创公司成为下一个独角兽。这就像是我生命中的又一个新篇章，也许我做不成功，我可能还得回到另一家公司或企业工作，但我喜欢挑战自己去追求另一个成功。这就是我的故事。