4 ms·

Why would they hire someone for COO and not give this person equity? Sympathy for the devil and all but these people were asking for something bad to happen.

egdod 7y ago
Why he would accept the job on those terms is the more salient question.
- caymanjim 7y ago
  I would take a solid salary over equity almost any day, having been burned by failed startups in the past, and/or left before my options vested. It'd be nice to get a solid salary AND equity, but I'm never going to work anywhere again where I take a pay cut in exchange for equity.
  - pault 7y ago
    I agree, but you'd probably have a different set of expectations if you were founding a company.
  - rayrrr 7y ago
    True that. Even a successful exit can lead to employee common stockholders (i.e. holders of stock gained through vested, executed options) getting screwed. Look what happened in Gilt Groupe's IPO, for example: https://www.vox.com/2016/1/19/11588918/gilt-groupe-is-a-cautionary-tale-for-startup-employees-banking-on https://www.vox.com/2016/1/19/11588918/gilt-groupe-is-a-caut...
milesskorpen 7y ago
Because — and this is amazing — NO ONE at Toptal has equity other than the founder: https://www.theinformation.com/articles/at-booming-toptal-no-stock-for-employees-or-investors https://www.theinformation.com/articles/at-booming-toptal-no... I find this sort of bonkers. Basically they all have contracts saying they'll get equity at the next round ... and the company is profitable and the CEO has no intention to every raise another round. So he currently owns 100% of the company: "As a result, even though it looks like a typical venture capital funded company, all of Toptal’s stock is in the hands of one person, co-founder and CEO Taso Du Val. Even Du Val’s co-founder and colleague for eight years, [redacted], has no shares." That said, I do wonder whether there's some bigger story in the background (since [redacted] is referred to as co-founder in the Information article, and is getting sued in the parent)
- rosybox 7y ago
  If you don't have equity, are you actually a co-founder?
- jerf 7y ago
  Maybe I'm just slow because this occurs to me hours later, but this One Man, One Stock Grant thing is a terrible idea; if the employees know about it, and they surely do now, they have incentive to try to drive the company in such a way that it needs to take capital to survive, so they get their payouts. This is probably not the most stable foundation upon which to build a company.
- PopeDotNinja 7y ago
  > Because — and this is amazing — NO ONE at Toptal has equity other than the founder Most businesses have a fixed number is of equity owners, including service business like Toptal. In most businesses like that, if you get any equity at all, it'd be unusual that you could keep the equity if you leave the company.
  - dpiers 7y ago
    Except Toptal is a “startup” that took $1.5mm in seed funding from investors like Andreesen Horowitz and promised employees equity.

egdod 7y ago

Why he would accept the job on those terms is the more salient question.

caymanjim 7y ago
I would take a solid salary over equity almost any day, having been burned by failed startups in the past, and/or left before my options vested. It'd be nice to get a solid salary AND equity, but I'm never going to work anywhere again where I take a pay cut in exchange for equity.
- pault 7y ago
  I agree, but you'd probably have a different set of expectations if you were founding a company.
- rayrrr 7y ago
  True that. Even a successful exit can lead to employee common stockholders (i.e. holders of stock gained through vested, executed options) getting screwed. Look what happened in Gilt Groupe's IPO, for example: https://www.vox.com/2016/1/19/11588918/gilt-groupe-is-a-cautionary-tale-for-startup-employees-banking-on https://www.vox.com/2016/1/19/11588918/gilt-groupe-is-a-caut...

milesskorpen 7y ago

Because — and this is amazing — NO ONE at Toptal has equity other than the founder: https://www.theinformation.com/articles/at-booming-toptal-no-stock-for-employees-or-investors https://www.theinformation.com/articles/at-booming-toptal-no... I find this sort of bonkers. Basically they all have contracts saying they'll get equity at the next round ... and the company is profitable and the CEO has no intention to every raise another round. So he currently owns 100% of the company: "As a result, even though it looks like a typical venture capital funded company, all of Toptal’s stock is in the hands of one person, co-founder and CEO Taso Du Val. Even Du Val’s co-founder and colleague for eight years, [redacted], has no shares." That said, I do wonder whether there's some bigger story in the background (since [redacted] is referred to as co-founder in the Information article, and is getting sued in the parent)

rosybox 7y ago
If you don't have equity, are you actually a co-founder?
jerf 7y ago
Maybe I'm just slow because this occurs to me hours later, but this One Man, One Stock Grant thing is a terrible idea; if the employees know about it, and they surely do now, they have incentive to try to drive the company in such a way that it needs to take capital to survive, so they get their payouts. This is probably not the most stable foundation upon which to build a company.
PopeDotNinja 7y ago
> Because — and this is amazing — NO ONE at Toptal has equity other than the founder Most businesses have a fixed number is of equity owners, including service business like Toptal. In most businesses like that, if you get any equity at all, it'd be unusual that you could keep the equity if you leave the company.
- dpiers 7y ago
  Except Toptal is a “startup” that took $1.5mm in seed funding from investors like Andreesen Horowitz and promised employees equity.