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(I work at YC) Yes, we care a lot about making employee equity more generous and more fair. Part of our YC curriculum now is teaching founders about these iss

(I work at YC) Yes, we care a lot about making employee equity more generous and more fair. Part of our YC curriculum now is teaching founders about these issues and encouraging them to follow best practices around being generous and transparent with employees about equity compensation like Sam discussed in his blog post. I think there is still a lot more we can do, though.

freewilly1040 6y ago
Teaching founders is one thing, but equally as important is providing a platform that prospective employees can use to find out which startups are giving employees a fair deal. Speaking as a bigco eng who would love to join a startup, but is disillusioned by the economics of it.
simonebrunozzi 6y ago
Good to hear this. I would be happy to spend an hour on a call with you and provide my very humble suggestions, if you're up for it. My HN username at gmail. Edit: of course we can do this over email, too. I just feel that in the year of Covid, you don't throw away an opportunity for a warmer human connection.
conanbatt 6y ago
What do you think are the next steps in improving this? My impression is that the one thing that will make a significant change in this is that private shares are liquid in secondary markets like Forge or Sharespost. It would be revolutionary to also valuate companies from the perspective of employees, being able to pick winners and negotiate more stock from the not-so-winners, where stock is worth less.
novok 6y ago
I pretty much ignore startup recruiters now because of my personal experience with the dynamic explained in the article. If recruiters explained that yes, we don't actually shaft you in their message, I might actually take a look.
lumost 6y ago
For what it's worth. I ignore private company equity offers of all stages as it's impossible to fairly value the equity which inevitably leads to an undervalued total compensation package - even on successful exit. I'd expect that the market would work out the generosity component if the terms were fair - but right now great startups are competing for employees with their second scarcest resource (cash) with companies that have effectively unlimited cash and great liquid equity. This is a recipe to burn the startups first scarcest resource (time) as projects run slower due to weaker execution, and for later stage companies leadership.

freewilly1040 6y ago

Teaching founders is one thing, but equally as important is providing a platform that prospective employees can use to find out which startups are giving employees a fair deal. Speaking as a bigco eng who would love to join a startup, but is disillusioned by the economics of it.

simonebrunozzi 6y ago

Good to hear this. I would be happy to spend an hour on a call with you and provide my very humble suggestions, if you're up for it. My HN username at gmail. Edit: of course we can do this over email, too. I just feel that in the year of Covid, you don't throw away an opportunity for a warmer human connection.

conanbatt 6y ago

What do you think are the next steps in improving this? My impression is that the one thing that will make a significant change in this is that private shares are liquid in secondary markets like Forge or Sharespost. It would be revolutionary to also valuate companies from the perspective of employees, being able to pick winners and negotiate more stock from the not-so-winners, where stock is worth less.

novok 6y ago

I pretty much ignore startup recruiters now because of my personal experience with the dynamic explained in the article. If recruiters explained that yes, we don't actually shaft you in their message, I might actually take a look.

lumost 6y ago

For what it's worth. I ignore private company equity offers of all stages as it's impossible to fairly value the equity which inevitably leads to an undervalued total compensation package - even on successful exit. I'd expect that the market would work out the generosity component if the terms were fair - but right now great startups are competing for employees with their second scarcest resource (cash) with companies that have effectively unlimited cash and great liquid equity. This is a recipe to burn the startups first scarcest resource (time) as projects run slower due to weaker execution, and for later stage companies leadership.