A warehouse-robotics startup offered me a 45% cash pay cut plus 1.2% in options. It has 18 months of runway and three pilots, but none are contracted yet. My partner’s income covers our essentials, though not retirement savings. Is the upside enough to justify leaving a stable engineering role?

The equity is not enough by itself to justify the move; treat it as uncertain upside and decide whether the job is a worthwhile career and life experiment even if the options end up worth zero. Before accepting, verify the option type, vesting, strike price, fully diluted percentage, exercise window, runway assumptions, and what turns a pilot into revenue. Then price the household cost of the pay cut and a six-month job search after failure. The move can be rational if the learning, ownership, and mission are valuable at that downside—not because 1.2% sounds large.