[stephenhuey]

I'd love to see YC or someone release a definitive recommendation on fair equity distribution among the employees of the company. Maybe there'd be a few variations on it to handle differing scenarios, and even if it's really hard to have a one-size-fits-all I think it'd be similar to their SAFE note which tries to offer a pretty good deal to all involved.

[jasode]

One of your favorited links is "Holloway Guide Equity Compensation"[1] and it has a section of typical percentages. It also mentions some higher percentages for employees which are not typical.

As for "fairness", it's going to ultimately be in the eye of the beholder. You could give employee #12 a 5% stake (which is CEO level at other startups) and yet that employee still feels it's "unfair" even it's explained that he's getting more than anybody else in SV. It's human nature for the employee to think he's worth more, and for the employer to think he's worth less -- and therefore, they negotiate.

[1] deep link to the employee ownership percentages: https://www.holloway.com/g/equity-compensation#_there_are_no...

[stephenhuey]

Thanks for reminding me! I've thought about this a lot from time to time, and I realize I forgot to mention something else besides just the equity distribution.

I've heard plenty of stories of nasty ways companies wrangle hard-earned equity out of employees. I think it'd be great for YC or someone of similar stature to encourage companies to use very standard terms to avoid a lot of the unkind ways employees get screwed. One example would be terribly short windows for exercising options.

[jasonkwon]

re: short windows for exercising options:

https://triplebyte.com/blog/fixing-the-inequity-of-startup-e...

https://blog.samaltman.com/employee-equity

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11198991

https://a16z.com/2016/07/26/options-plan/

https://dangelo.quora.com/10-Year-Exercise-Periods-Make-Sens...

[sroussey]

It’s also interesting that almost no one mentions % of what — the whole company or of the current option pool.

[mmt]

I think it's pretty widely understood that the denominator is the whole company.

[jasonkwon]

yes, that's what we meant by the percentages.