I assume that stock was in the form of restricted stock units that vest over the course of a few years. I’ve seen this kind of thing play out at a few big tech companies over the years and have seen people lose literally hundreds of thousands of dollars in delayed payout.
They offer these as a “loyalty incentive” so the employee wants to stay while of course offering no loyalty in return when they decide to execute layoffs.
Plays out in small tech companies too, albeit in a slightly different way.
Got that carrot dangled in front of me at a past job. Company was past start-up phase; self-supporting and doing ok, but not outrageously well. Promises of riches should the company be “noticed” and bought for an outrageous amount.
Of course none of that accounted for the CEO (founder and 85% shareholder) being an absolute crazy person, who would change the development roadmap into making a vastly different product than the one we (the techies) believed in, TURN DOWN THE OUTRAGEOUS SUM BECAUSE HE THOUGHT HE COULD GET A BETTER OFFER, basically run the company into the ground, and wind up selling it for a pittance (which would have made the employees’ share a pittance of a pittance).
I mean most of us had already left by that point, but finding out around 4 years after that he’d turned down about $150M and wound up selling out for $3M, that stung a little.
Hey, I worked there!
Sounds familiar to me too.
Except these were never meant to be paid out. Bungee isn’t about to give away their company to their employees.
It’s a plastic carrot.
Yes, I am certain that was the case. It was the case in my examples too… Every now and then someone gets through and gets a couple units to vest, but the majority are gone and so is that compensation. It’s disgusting.
I assume they have to cash in some. Or else the SEC comes sniffing around like “you guys have given out 3 million shares over ten years but no one has ever cashed a singled one out, hmmmmm”. So those are likely the rare few. And a few units tracks because they aren’t giving $2m in stock to some entry level tech.
I always liken those practices to the same shit they flash musicians or sports figures during negotiations. Wave a mansion, Lambo, gold, some ladies making all kinds of promised. But in the end, some contractual loop hole says that you’re just “borrowing” it all. Fake money.
RSUs can be a great bonus, but agreed, you definitely shouldn’t consider RSUs part of your total compensation unless they vest quarterly to yearly. If they take a full four years to start vesting you definitely shouldn’t count on that income.
WHAT! This is very scummy, especially on the company shares part. Basically robbing employees of their money.
I really don’t understand in what universe this is not considered theft?
Wage theft is #1 in terms of total $ amount stolen out of all forms of theft, but business owners own government so… 🤷
What a dick move, especially the second one. Really goes to show that management seems to forget they’re dealing with actual humans and not machines being turned off at an assembly line. So dehumanizing.
Per “a source” lol
Yeesh. More like bung_hole_, amirite?
