[Iknown0thing]

More than percentages, it is the terms that matter. You can get a decent percentage of a early stage company, but end up making no money even if the company sells for 10-100x of the valuation at the time of stock options. Be sure you understand the terms.

[te0x]

Can you expand on this? What are some of the terms that should be careful examined?

[Iknown0thing]

Most of them are related to how and when your stocks are vested. Most companies never IPO and get to a point where you can sell your stocks on secondary markets. So vesting period and terms of it are important. For example - if you dont have accelerated vesting, you end up getting nothing when the company is acquired even at a good valuation. Depends on terms of acquisition as well and what happens to employee stock pool when acquisition happens.