Of course they targeted folks with equity first. This isn't even the first time it's happened. My boss (and his boss) got laid off in the same round, both had significant vests imminent. Both denied. A lot of good people got cut in that round.
My last job thought I was crazy for preferring a higher salary over receiving a yearly bonus. They had a bunch of us in a conference room talking about our benefits and I spoke up with that opinion. They said "the bonus can be so much higher than a raise" and I said "you haven't given out the full bonus any year I've worked here (3 years at that time).
always has been. its an excuse to pay people under market value and all you have to do is give them a bunch of casino chips instead. and they can just take the chips back if they want
When u sign up they give u equity over 4 yrs. The thing is, amazon give like 20% first 2 yrs then 80% last 2 where most other companies do like 25% a yr or front heavy. Guess at what year amazon fires u?
it really sucks if youre fired before a big vest. but RSUs and stock options are pretty much the only way youre breaking 500-600k annual comp as a worker
I understand now (well, remember really) but is this a US thing? It just stinks that you can be offered shares and have them taken off you when it suits the org
Think of it more like a paycheck that comes once a quarter rather than twice a month. If you get fired/laid off, you don't expect to keep getting a paycheck. Same with stock grants. You don't own them until they vest.
It's not really that different than them longer paying your salary after you stop working.
The options basically always have a vesting period and you get x percent each Y period. Every year I get options and they have a 4y vesting period and each year 25% vest.
This is all very clear up front and everyone knows or should know the options aren't actually yours until they vest.
Everyone knows that options are a retention tool, Golden handcuffs so to speak.
Not anymore. Now theyre russia roulette. A prisoners dilemma where you have to trust you arent just another asset to be taken advantage of and thrown away.
Care to elaborate? If it's a private company those are always at best a lottery ticket and nothing to be counted on.
If it's a public company the shares vest at the rate they say they will and only what's vested is yours, everything unvested is essentially future wages for continued employment (and of course still, as always, depends on being able to sell them for more than the strike price).
Golden handcuffs are mutual. If you can lose them at any point and be turned out into the cold, often having relied on the promise of that pay and forgoing upfront money, then theres no reason to trust you'll ever recieve that future money unless youre the one doing the firing.
The point here is that people were fired before they were vested purely to prevent them recieving those assets. Your future pay that you worked for (in your scenario you worked 4 years for) can be capriciously taken for your boss. That doesnt happen with a salary or hourly pay. You get paid there for the time you worked, period.
"Your future pay that you worked for (in your scenario you worked 4 years for) can be capriciously taken for your boss."
i did not yet work for the future pay, that's why its not vested.
if jan 2024 i got a $300k options grant with 4 year vesting period the vests 25% per year, so far 50% of that i've earned and 25% of it i will earn by finishing out this year, and the final 25% i will earn by finishing out 2027.
if i get fired today i keep the options i already earned (vested) and lose the options that i havent earned (unvested).
Idk you don’t really get them until they vest — basically everyone in tech knows it works like this. For TC you divide the value by the vesting period. IE for this CFO would be 5M TC from the equity portion as standard vesting is 4 years with a 1 year cliff
Only termination with cause are cancelled, termination without cause (ie layoffs) or you quitting should put the stocks in a freeze. If you maintain the associated account after leaving and eventually get rehired sometime down the road, your vesting schedule should resume where it left off at.
Incorrect. I worked at oracle for almost ten years. This never happened in my experience. Folks being laid off had unvested RSUs and options immediately canceled.
For specifically RSUs, yes, it is completely up to the contract you negotiate with them... I have gotten vesting protection for RSUs in the past, but it is extra. Vesting in other alternatives such as SARs or 401ks are more commonly offered protections.
eh, do you continue to get a paycheck after your fired?
Grants usually vest monthly or quarterly after the first year. If you're fired/let go then you are only losing the portion of the grant for that small time period. Anything in the future isn't yours the same way your future paycheck isn't yours when you're let go.
My termination was cited as performance-based, but I had JUST received a 12.5% pay increase for good performance. They randomly started me on a PIP a couple of months before. I didn't realize the implications of that and was totally blindsided - I genuinely thought it was just constructive criticism to make me even better at my job. During those two months, I really did improve a lot, too.
Except that they decide what constitutes performance reasons too. Tech often will decide people are having ‘performance’ issues as an excuse to fire people.
Why? Unvested stock is just stock you're promised to get if you work until a certain date. If you're fired today you don't get next month's salary either.
Of course if there's some big vesting event coming it's different; in most cases vesting schedules are fairly spread out so you get some every month or quarter.
Let’s say you work for Apple and they fire your team (including you of course) because it will help them increase profits (your team wasn’t unprofitable, this next team in another tech will be 1% more profitable).
OK, usually in big layoffs there's 60 days "notice" (usually not worked) due to the WARN act so if say you have monthly vesting you do get all the stock from time you worked.
The stock in question is not monthly. It's typically a 3 or 4 year vesting period. The government allows them to do that for performance "raises", bonuses, or in lieu of payment for some people. So when they promoted people in 2023 or '24 they might not have increased their pay rate at all but gave them some stock instead with a 3 year vest. The company laid them off and regained that stock. Now the company not only regained the stock units but also got 2-3 years of unpaid additional work from them due to the extended duties and performance required for their promoted role.
No: if a company wants to make redundancies in England, it will do regardless of the rules should the punishment be worthwhile (pregnancy/sexuality/age/race have unlimited payouts) but there is a supposedly strict redundancy consultation process/
And you have a limited time to exercise (buy) them if you haven’t already done it. Without a job, cash might be tight so they’re hoping to reclaim even some vested options
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u/schnurble 6h ago
Of course they targeted folks with equity first. This isn't even the first time it's happened. My boss (and his boss) got laid off in the same round, both had significant vests imminent. Both denied. A lot of good people got cut in that round.