For decades, the tech world held certain “truths” that felt like gospel. These weren’t just HR talking points, they were battle-tested principles that actually worked when building teams and competing for talent. But, Meta appears to be systematically torching these sacred assumptions with a ridiculously simple strategy: pay way more than anyone else is willing to pay.
Gospel 1: Missionaries are different from Mercenaries
It’s not as black or white anymore
The idea that “missionaries” (the true believers, who live and breathe your mission) build lasting companies, while “mercenaries” just chase paychecks, has been startup dogma. The hope was that mission-driven people believed in the vision so deeply they’d take below-market startup cash comp (guaranteed) — trading risk for the promise of equity — all because they believed in the mission and the future value of that equity.
Well, Meta just flipped that premise on its head. Their actions seem to be proving that if you pay missionaries enough, they’ll start acting like mercenaries — and if you pay mercenaries enough, they’ll work like missionaries. When you’re spending tens to hundreds of millions per person, even the most mission-driven folks start having second thoughts about their current gig.
Here’s the uncomfortable truth we believe Meta exposed: pretty much every “missionary” has a number where mission suddenly becomes less important than financial security. I’m not judging — it’s human, even for founders like me who’ve sold previous companies.
The interesting lesson here is that founders need a clear list of key folks in their org where outsized compensation is a price worth paying to keep them. This ensures that you don’t find yourself in a place where the entire mission of the company depends on someone Meta might come to poach tomorrow.
Gospel 2: Top Talent Cares More About Teams and Challenges Than Money
Turns out, money can cover enough ground
We’ve been telling ourselves this story for years: truly exceptional talent cares more about working with A+ players and solving cool problems than maximizing their paycheck. Silicon Valley built entire cultures around this idea. Craft compelling technical challenges, obsess over hiring bar, create environments where smart people want to hang out with other smart people.
Meta is shattering this theory. They pulled world-class talent from companies with interesting technical challenges and great engineering cultures seemingly by offering packages massively above market, and more importantly, pairing that with access to data, compute resources, and the promise of an even better resources lab than what they’re leaving (This tweet covers this well).
The reality is even A+ talent has financial goals — mortgages, kids’ college funds, retirement planning. When you can compress a lifetime of wealth-building into 3-4 years, it’s natural for intellectually curious engineers to be open about making a move.
Gospel 3: Comp Bands Keep Things Fair and Predictable
Until they don’t
Compensation bands — pay ranges for each level — have been the backbone of “fair and scalable” hiring. They help keep pay equitable, provide predictable career progression, keep hiring managers from making emotional decisions, and prevent excessive bidding wars.
Meta’s actions seem to be saying, “forget all that”. They appear to have decided that financial discipline is less important than talent acquisition. When Meta offers a Staff Engineer tens of millions to join, they’re not just breaking their own comp band; they’re challenging the industry’s understanding of what that role should cost.
Companies trying to stick to disciplined comp bands can’t compete for top talent, and those trying to match Meta’s offers are watching their entire compensation structure implode. Meta has seemingly weaponized compensation inflation, forcing everyone else to choose between their talent strategy and financial sustainability.
Gospel 4: Aquihire Talent
Why buy the company when you can poach the talent?
Aquihires used to be this elegant strategy — buy promising teams at struggling startups for $1-3M per engineer. You get cost-effective talent acquisition, plus existing team dynamics and proven ability to ship stuff together.
Meta’s recent actions have made traditional aquihires look like discount shopping. Why buy a 10-person startup for $20M when you can poach their top talent for $20M in individual comp packages? They seem to be doing “virtual selective aquihires,” cherry-picking the stars without any M&A headaches.
This has implications on investors, who might have to write off the rest, and on the employees who aren’t poached away.
Seismic Shift, or One-Off?
We believe that Meta isn’t just changing hiring practices — they’re shining a light on how many hiring truths were just ways to justify paying less than the talent’s true value. When someone shows up willing to pay way above market rates, all our sophisticated theories about motivation and culture are out the door.
The big question now: is Meta’s massive spending spree a one-off case or the beginning of a larger, more aggressive shift in tech hiring? One towards highly differentiated compensation with R&D teams structured more like sports teams, with mega-earning stars supported by a solid supporting cast? Either way, it’s a fascinating time to watch how these strategies evolve and to rethink how we attract and retain talent in this AI era.
The content here should not be viewed as investment advice, nor does it constitute an offer to sell, or a solicitation of an offer to buy, any securities. The views expressed here are those of the individual Lightspeed Management Company, L.L.C. (“Lightspeed”) personnel and are not the views of Lightspeed or its affiliates; other market participants could take different views.
Unless otherwise indicated, the inclusion of any third-party firm and/or company names, brands and/or logos does not imply any affiliation with these firms or companies.
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