I have come across early stage startups where the founders try to lowball you on the compensation by painting a very rosy picture of the future and a verbal commitment for offering generous ESOPs. Such commitments are almost never honored :) Have you experienced something similar?
It depends on the founder's values. The founder's that I met were completely different. One treated me like a younger brother and tried to keep me around directly/indirectly even after my exit from that startup. One thing he always mentioned was, you were an early member and I don't want you to lose out on this opportunity of making money.
Two things I don’t understand:
Why would you not pickup esop of an early startup as a candidate? It’s the only chance at riches that exists.
Why would you not deliver the promised ESOPs to candidates? This is just trickery
On such rosy promises & lollipop of co-founder given at one time, I joined one such startup in 2016 and once I asked for it on written documentation, dillydallying started and at last I had to leave it without getting paid for 3 months.
All depends on trust plus proper paperwork.