Up and Running

DECEMBER 1, 2015

Stock options are issued to employees usually through an Employee Stock Option Plan (ESOP) and include what is called a “vesting period.” The vesting period, often three or four years, frees up a percentage of the options for the employee to purchase the longer they stay at the company. See Also: How to Hire Your First Employee.

Equity 60

Equity Employee Stock Options Vesting 60

Altgate

JUNE 25, 2012

. —————– Dead equity — equity held by employees and founders no longer working at the company — is a large and growing problem. One who attracted much attention is David Choe, the graffiti artist hired to paint the company’s first headquarters. They fail to include vesting terms (i.e.,

Equity 44

Equity Vesting Cap Table Technical Review 44

www.metamorphblog.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

Home About Contact Home About Contact The Metamorphosis Becoming an Entrepreneur, by Matt Mireles Startup Lessons for the Proto-Founder I started SpeakerText in October 2008 during the financial apocalypse. You need a Co-Founder, not an Engineering Bitch. We hired three guys from that batch and paid them in iPhones.

Founder 51

Founder Startup Cofounder Vesting 51

The Startup Magazine

JULY 19, 2020

Many law firms simply use the last name of their founder, or combine multiple names together. Competition can be tough among law firms, so it’s important to hire a developer to build you a website that stands out from the crowd. Hire Capable Staff. The benefits they provide should justify any cost. Set Up a Website.

Vesting 150

Vesting Reputation Hiring Community 150

David Teten

OCTOBER 1, 2015

What are the terms of their relationship with the founder? I’ve also asked this question on Quora.There, I ask for advice on how to best structure this for all parties: The development shop, the founders (outside of the dev shop), and potential outside investors. What are the timelines? The discounts? The cliffs? The fine print?

Software Developers 60

Software Developers Software Development Software Review Technical Cofounder 60

The Next Web

AUGUST 26, 2013

Editor’s note: This is a guest post by Christian Reber, CEO and co-founder of Berlin-based 6Wunderkinder. Today, in steps 10-12 I want to discuss with you raising your first round of money, hiring to develop and maintain your company culture, as well as defining your role in the management of your startup. 60-70% for founders.

Management 120

Management Cofounder Startup Bootstrapping 120

Altgate

AUGUST 25, 2012

. —————– Dead equity — equity held by employees and founders no longer working at the company — is a large and growing problem. One who attracted much attention is David Choe, the graffiti artist hired to paint the company’s first headquarters. They fail to include vesting terms (i.e.,

Equity 28

Equity Vesting Cap Table Technical Review 28

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 5, 2011

Great lifestyle, great cost of living, motivated people and only the crap weather on the negative side. I gave him the same advice I give nearly all over-worked, control-freak, do-everything-yourself startup founders: “Your number one priority isn’t any of these things. There’s you and your killer CTO co-founder.

Seattle 317

Seattle Silicon Valley Technical Review Los Angeles 317

Austin Startup

AUGUST 20, 2017

Hiring is a chapter unto itself, but it deserves to lead off any discussion of context. Compensation decisions obviously affect hiring and retention. You can’t be too careful in determining comp packages for your new hires. Kalanick, former investor BFF turned highly disappointed by founder behavior.

Technical Review 48

Technical Review Software Review Cap Table Securities and Exchange Commission 48

techcrunch.com

JUNE 22, 2012

This is where a lot of founders get stuck. Not to mention, once the founder and advisor have nominally agreed to a relationship, law firms enter the mix and seed the new advisor with a mountain of paperwork — legal agreements, options agreements — documents stuffed with legalese and binding statements.

Equity 94

Equity San Francisco Startup Silicon Valley 94

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 18, 2009

Yesterday I wrote a blog post ( here ) in which I urged people to not have too many founders. What if the person performs OK, but not great and you need to hire above him? These situations are only compounded if you have 3 or more founders. They agreed to all be co-founders. Who prevails? 2 of the 3 want the job.

Founder 251

Founder Cofounder Equity Stock Options 251

Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 7, 2013

Here are five of the most common examples: Failure to document a Founder agreement at the beginning. This oversight can lead to the so-called “forgotten Founder” problem. Trouble with the IRS over Founders stock value. Entrepreneurs often put off the hassle and the cost of filing a patent until first funding.

Non-Compete 235

Non-Compete Accredited Investor Startup Cofounder 235

Gust

APRIL 9, 2014

The Founder of a company starts by owning all the shares representing ownership of the company. Therefore, to avoid dilution to its existing equity holders, all a company has to do is not hire any more employees who get options, or take any more money from investors. Uncategorized company equity dilution founder investors startup'

Dilution 150

Dilution Equity Vesting Stock Options 150

Reid Hoffman

DECEMBER 10, 2020

These are really good founders and I think this is an interesting space.” Further, when additional people kept mentioning Airbnb to me and praising the founders, I should have asked myself how a smart, capable person would refine the idea.). Those two minutes showed me that Airbnb’s founders wanted to play in the big leagues.

Hosting 69

Hosting Hockey Stick IPO Silicon Valley 69

Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 10, 2012

Here are five of the most common examples: Failure to document a Founder agreement at the beginning. This oversight can lead to the so-called “forgotten founder” problem. Trouble with the IRS over Founders stock value. Entrepreneurs often put off the hassle and the cost of filing a patent until first funding.

Non-Compete 249

Non-Compete Accredited Investor Cofounder Startup 249

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 10, 2015

I often speak about co-founder fighting and how this ends in lawsuits but this has become much more prevalent. I’d encourage you to watch this quick 3-minute video with some views on what I call “ The Co-Founder Mythology ” that is perpetuated in Silicon Valley. Lawsuits are particularly common amongst co-founders.

Vesting 150

Vesting Cofounder IP Stock Options 150

www.paulgraham.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

Single Founder Have you ever noticed how few successful startups were founded byjust one person? Even companies you think of as having one founder,like Oracle, usually turn out to have more. Whats wrong with having one founder? It probably means the founder couldnt talk anyof his friends into starting the company with him.

Startup 108

Startup Software Review Hiring Detroit 108

www.paulgraham.com

APRIL 28, 2010

I think it would help founders to understand funding better—notjust the mechanics of it, but what investors are thinking. And if trouble withinvestors is one of the biggest threats to a startup, managing themis one of the most important skills founders need to learn. Few startups get it quite right. Many are underfunded.

Technical Review 76

Technical Review Startup Software Review Angel Investor 76

Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 2, 2011

Here are five of the most common examples: Failure to document a founder agreement at the beginning. This oversight can lead to the so-called “forgotten founder” problem. Early co-founders often drop out of the picture due to disagreements, and you forget about them, but they don’t forget about the verbal promises you made.

Non-Compete 246

Non-Compete Accredited Investor Entrepreneur Cofounder 246

blog.aparttimecto.com

OCTOBER 23, 2010

Unless you’re fortunate to have one or more technical founders, you’ll quickly be faced with this simple question: Do we hack out a prototype somehow, find a developer or outsource the development? Create the prototype yourself Pros: Cheap - this only takes up the time of your and your founders.

CTO Hire 40

CTO Hire Fractional CTO Equity Vesting 40

www.quora.com

SEPTEMBER 22, 2011

Type to Add and Search Questions; Search Topics and People Startups Startup Compensation Entrepreneurship Compensation Stock Options Major Internet Companies Silicon Valley Why is there such a large founder to early employee equity drop-off? The real question here is: why is it fair for founders to get so much more?

Equity 40

Equity Employee Founder Cofounder 40

David Teten

DECEMBER 3, 2019

Tim Friedman, Founder, PE Stack , said, “If I could offer one piece of advice to today’s managers, it would be to take the time to understand the demands of the modern institutional LP. Russell Rothstein, Founder and CEO, IT Central Station , a product review site, said, “We see VCs on our site very often. 3) Raise capital.

Technical Review 78

Technical Review Software Review Analytics Private Equity 78

Ben's Blog

APRIL 28, 2010

In this post, I describe why we prefer to fund companies whose founder will run the company as its CEO. As we looked at the history of great technology companies, we discovered that founders ran an overwhelming majority of them for a very long time, including: Acer—Stan Shih. Thomas Watson, Sr. The innovation business. Moral authority.

Technical Review 78

Technical Review Cofounder Technical Cofounder Software Review 78

Up and Running

JULY 11, 2017

They staffed the team with several veteran engineers and augmented it with talented new hires that had expertise in areas outside of Stryker medical’s core competencies including aptitudes useful in developing key new technologies for advanced patient surfaces and mattresses. Moreover, Stryker’s bed had come in way over cost.

Technical Review 80

Technical Review Development Team Review Differentiation Leadership 80

www.chubbybrain.com

SEPTEMBER 28, 2011

created a vastly higher cost structure; I had 80 people mostly on base salaries under $100,000 and was bringing in revenue at the rate of $20 million annually. Contributing to the high cost structure was the new culture of working 9-5 Monday through Friday. Post-Mortem Title : My eHarmony for Hiring Failure. Go vest yourself.

Software Review 79

Software Review Startup Technical Review Vesting 79

www.inc.com

SEPTEMBER 24, 2011

Back in 1997, Randy Parker was staring at a blank whiteboard, wondering where hed find the money to hire the employees and consultants he needed to build his new product. "We That cost him accounting fees, legal fees, and time because the financing round couldnt close until the arrangements were formalized.

Fractional CTO 40

Fractional CTO Equity Iowa Technical Cofounder 40

Eric Friedman

JUNE 27, 2016

This is the classic “hire people smarter than you” which is harder said than done. Total = 0.75% for 3 advisors that vest as you see fit to help you over the next 1–4 years (more on vesting below). Here are the questions I like to see founders ask potential advisors; 1. Vesting Schedules. Advisor 2 = 0.25%.

Equity 98

Equity Vesting Cap Table Common Stock 98

Transformify

DECEMBER 22, 2019

I’ve seen lots of startup founders making the same mistake – spending all the funding they have on headcount and expensive and inefficient marketing campaigns. Even more, some founders are not interested in the churn rate at all early on. The one thing both freelancers and business clients need is an office.

Affiliate 91

Affiliate Revenue Churn Rate Programming 91

venturehacks.com

MARCH 21, 2008

Advisor compensation Whether you’re hiring a normal advisor or super advisor: Advisory shares are usually issued as common stock options. The options typically vest monthly over 1-2 years with 100% single-trigger acceleration and no cliff. The opportunity cost is probably too high. Our Book Check out the free samples.

Advisory Board 44

Advisory Board Cap Table Vesting Equity 44

Startup Lessons Learned

JUNE 9, 2020

I've known Brian Chesky, Co-Founder, CEO and Head of Community at Airbnb for a long time. I think every founder, every CEO, every leader, could learn something, could take heart from Brian's example and I hope they will. Brian Chesky : I am Brian Chesky, co-founder, CEO, and head of community at Airbnb. I hope you will.

Silicon Valley 60

Silicon Valley Hosting Cofounder Employee 60

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 19, 2010

Here are some examples: Failure to document a founder agreement at the beginning. This shortcut can lead to the so-called “forgotten founder” problem. Early co-founders often drop out of the picture due to disagreements, and you forget about them, but they don’t forget about the verbal promises you made. Marty Zwilling.

Non-Compete 125

Non-Compete Accredited Investor Startup Cofounder 125

ConversionXL

NOVEMBER 6, 2019

Mike Arsenault and his two co-founders—all with technical backgrounds—built their MVP while working full time for other SaaS companies. “We We also got lucky and qualified for some startup benefits with companies like Rackspace, who covered our infrastructure costs for the first year,” continues Arsenault. “We spent $1k on their MVP.

Sweat Equity 78

Sweat Equity Software Review Vesting Cofounder 78

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 19, 2018

A detailed financial model that shows your anticipated revenue, costs and profits (Income Statement) as well as your balance sheet and cashflow statements. VCs (and LPs) have a vested interest in having more data, whether they want to invest in your company / firm or not. They aren’t doing this viciously?—?they

Cap Table 336

Cap Table Due Diligence Forecast Churn Rate 336

www.chubbybrain.com

SEPTEMBER 28, 2011

After a thorough analysis of those 32 start-up post-mortems, we have determined the common reasons founders gave to compile this list of the top 20 ways to have your startup fail. Work life balance is not something that startup founders often get and so the risk of burning out is high. 13 – Disharmony with Investors/Co-founders.

Cofounder 89

Cofounder Startup Technical Cofounder CTO Hire 89

The Next Web

DECEMBER 29, 2013

Startups will start hiring experienced storytellers who will help propel their brands to new heights through a combination of thought leadership, social media prowess and wordsmithing. Founders, executives and decision makers don’t have time to consistently create quality content and then properly distribute it. Expert Storytellers.

Social Media 164

Social Media Vesting Distribution 164

maplebutter.com

JANUARY 8, 2013

You are here: Home » Hiring » Crazy! Written By Dan Martell on February 2nd, 2012 | Category: Hiring LeanStartup Marketing Metrics Startup Life | 6 Comments. Outsourcing is something a big company, with a known customer / problem (that has revenue & traction) does to save cost. you can hire for those.

Technical Review 44

Technical Review Startup Cofounder Software Review 44

Altgate

APRIL 28, 2012

Since 2000, I’ve been collecting information about startups, including how much founders, their lieutenants, and their employees get paid. That research forms the basis for my annual CompStudy survey, as well as the quantitative backbone for my new book, The Founder’s Dilemmas: Anticipating and Avoiding the Pitfalls That Can Sink a Startup.

Silicon Valley 50

Silicon Valley Vesting New York City Equity 50