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You're definitely getting shafted if you're working for a privately held start-up and they don't give you a 10 year exercise window. Many start-ups pay "median
by choppaface 7y ago
You're definitely getting shafted if you're working for a privately held start-up and they don't give you a 10 year exercise window. Many start-ups pay "median" salary or below, which make their numbers look bad versus levels.fyi. But in many cases if a start-up has an exit, then early employees will easily eclipse what they'd earn at FAANG. (Later employees, maybe not ..).
The 10 year exercise window should be standard behavior by now; if you're not given 10 years, your employer sadly doesn't want to be competitive. https://triplebyte.com/blog/fixing-the-inequity-of-startup-equity https://triplebyte.com/blog/fixing-the-inequity-of-startup-e...
- corporateslave5 7y agoActually it’s rare for the options to be worth more than FAANG options. Only the earliest stage employees do well, and adjusted for the risk they take, it’s a really bad deal
- TomVDB 7y agoIf I have learned one thing is that's much better to get paid very well for 20 years at a big tech company than it is to be paid median at some smaller outfit hoping to hit the jackpot. Because even when the start-up has a successful exit, and even if you were an early employee, you'll still have a very small chance of out-earning your buddy who joined big tech. This has been especially true in the past 10 years: look at the stock prices of Google, Facebook, Apple, etc. They've all gone up significantly, making those yearly RSU additions even more valuable. In a rising market, a 4 year vesting schedule works to the advantage of its owner.