You may want to caveat this post that this advice is applicable to all levels of an organization, but that junior people can often get by on understanding #3 (especially the equity part) and going with their gut on #4. Since their risk profile is very different from a more senior person (with perhaps a family/mortgage/etc) I often advise people not to get too bogged down in the details of #2. Additionally, the information you get on #1, if it's coming from the founder/CEO, is often given through rose-colored glasses and ultimately may not be all that useful to the final decision. After all, what founder doesn't want to think that the first round they raised will bring them to profitability or that if they want to accelerate growth in the future that investors will be beating down their door to participate?

To sum up, for junior employees at the beginning stages of their career, stick with #4 while understanding #3. #1 and #2 are just so damn fluid that it doesn't do much good getting bogged down in those details.