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The way I read it - she was being not-so-subtly hinted to search for another job. No way in hell the management wouldn't realize how refusing a 4-year old empl

The way I read it - she was being not-so-subtly hinted to search for another job. No way in hell the management wouldn't realize how refusing a 4-year old employee any options would look on her end. Zero is zero. It's like leaving a 1c tip at a restaurant. So this was most certainly done on purpose.

the_gipsy 7y ago
Or, the way she said it - she was young and ignorant of how options work. And management knew this, tried, and got away with it easily.
- huhtenberg 7y ago
  Issuing no options to a 4 year old employee can mean exactly one thing - it was not a very valuable employee that they weren't keen on retaining. That's about it.
  - prepend 7y ago
    I don’t know what an “Operations Associate” is but having a junior person report directly to the COO seems like a really junior admin/help with everything/type. It’s weird that the COO wouldn’t give options to her admin, I think. It could also be OP overestimating her value. When I was starting out I thought that working super hard and helping everywhere was the most important thing in the world to me. It took me a while to figure out how value is created for organizations.
    - goatinaboat 7y ago
      Microsoft and Apple made all their early secretaries rich.
      - dexterdog 7y ago
        Not the ones that quit when the companies were a just few years old.
  - the_gipsy 7y ago
    It would be "about it" if employees simply got payed their value, which is never the case.
  - sokoloff 7y ago
    She had been there about 2 years. The company was about 4 at the time.
  - dexterdog 7y ago
    She was a 1.5yo employee when the equity discussion happened. Then she left shortly after.
prepend 7y ago
Or more likely management didn’t care whether she looked for new employment. I’ve been through three of four of these situations and every time there is a list of positions that management deems important enough to grant options. It was always clear how not being on that list is perceived and that people might quit and some consideration was made to not risk losing some they considered important enough. I bet it wasn’t the author’s title but the author. The COO knew who she was and didn’t think she was important enough to grant options. Saying it was because she had the wrong title seems like a coward move. I never felt good being on or off the list or making the list. I think it’s better to award some amount to all early staff. One of the myths and legends of tech that I loved hearing as a kid was the Microsoft secretary who is not a millionaire. Options grants like this describe the character of a company. I don’t think it’s impossible to work in an org like this, but it should be a factor in choosing to stay or choosing to join.
- ktaylor 7y ago
  This is a good interpretation of the event as I understand it. Culturally, it would be a good move to grant all employees before x date a token number of units so they felt validated. $1k worth of units to a few dozen employees is a rounding errors worth of dilution but would pay many intangible dividends to the culture. I do think, ultimately, the bulk of incentive equity should go to those most likely to make significant contributions.
np_tedious 7y ago
I think your point is still largely correct, but the dates are a bit off (I too found the timeline in the tweet confusing so I turned to linkedin) 2010 - WeWork is founded 2011 (Nov) - author joins 2013 ("mid") - has equity discussion 2013 (Oct) - author leaves She was an employee of slightly under 2 years, and it seems she did leave shortly after this equity related convo with her boss.

the_gipsy 7y ago

Or, the way she said it - she was young and ignorant of how options work. And management knew this, tried, and got away with it easily.

huhtenberg 7y ago
Issuing no options to a 4 year old employee can mean exactly one thing - it was not a very valuable employee that they weren't keen on retaining. That's about it.
- prepend 7y ago
  I don’t know what an “Operations Associate” is but having a junior person report directly to the COO seems like a really junior admin/help with everything/type. It’s weird that the COO wouldn’t give options to her admin, I think. It could also be OP overestimating her value. When I was starting out I thought that working super hard and helping everywhere was the most important thing in the world to me. It took me a while to figure out how value is created for organizations.
  - goatinaboat 7y ago
    Microsoft and Apple made all their early secretaries rich.
    - dexterdog 7y ago
      Not the ones that quit when the companies were a just few years old.
- the_gipsy 7y ago
  It would be "about it" if employees simply got payed their value, which is never the case.
- sokoloff 7y ago
  She had been there about 2 years. The company was about 4 at the time.
- dexterdog 7y ago
  She was a 1.5yo employee when the equity discussion happened. Then she left shortly after.

prepend 7y ago

Or more likely management didn’t care whether she looked for new employment. I’ve been through three of four of these situations and every time there is a list of positions that management deems important enough to grant options. It was always clear how not being on that list is perceived and that people might quit and some consideration was made to not risk losing some they considered important enough. I bet it wasn’t the author’s title but the author. The COO knew who she was and didn’t think she was important enough to grant options. Saying it was because she had the wrong title seems like a coward move. I never felt good being on or off the list or making the list. I think it’s better to award some amount to all early staff. One of the myths and legends of tech that I loved hearing as a kid was the Microsoft secretary who is not a millionaire. Options grants like this describe the character of a company. I don’t think it’s impossible to work in an org like this, but it should be a factor in choosing to stay or choosing to join.

ktaylor 7y ago
This is a good interpretation of the event as I understand it. Culturally, it would be a good move to grant all employees before x date a token number of units so they felt validated. $1k worth of units to a few dozen employees is a rounding errors worth of dilution but would pay many intangible dividends to the culture. I do think, ultimately, the bulk of incentive equity should go to those most likely to make significant contributions.

np_tedious 7y ago

I think your point is still largely correct, but the dates are a bit off (I too found the timeline in the tweet confusing so I turned to linkedin) 2010 - WeWork is founded 2011 (Nov) - author joins 2013 ("mid") - has equity discussion 2013 (Oct) - author leaves She was an employee of slightly under 2 years, and it seems she did leave shortly after this equity related convo with her boss.