One of the real cons of joining a startup that doesn't grow fast is that the founders of the startup will structure the acquisition so that the early employees get nothing. I'm talking about the "well the company has no value after paying back the investors, but the founders and their friends got sweet hiring deals at newco that otherwise they would have had to share with the other employees" sort of quasi-acquihires.

I've been through two of those (and successfully forced the acquiring company to give me $ in one of them because of how venally obvious the deal was.) I hear of these sorts of things happening relatively frequently. It's a real reason that I probably wouldn't participate in another startup.

For me personally, it isn't the risk of failure that keeps me from joining another startup as an early engineer. It's the risk that the founders will cut a deal in an acquisition that cuts out the early employees.

This would also be good for the acquiring company, they have a large risk in cutting a deal just for the founders. In one of the cases that I know of, the acquihire was a disaster because the founders represented to the company that they had the expertise that rested within the early employees and it ended with a great deal of waste.

So, fix this issue and I think you'll see better results overall.