editione2.1.1
Updated September 12, 2022βDefinitionβ Vesting is the process of gaining full legal rights to something. In the context of compensation, founders, executives, and employees typically gain rights to their grant of equity incrementally over time, subject to restrictions. People may refer to their shares or stock options vesting, or may say that a person is vesting or has fully vested.
βDefinitionβ In the majority of cases, vesting occurs incrementally over time, according to a vesting schedule. A person vests only while they work for the company. If the person quits or is terminated immediately, they get no equity, and if they stay for years, theyβll get most or all of it.
Awards of stock, stock options, and RSUs are almost always subject to a vesting schedule.
βDefinitionβ Vesting schedules can have a cliff designating a length of time that a person must work before they vest at all.
For example, if your equity award had a one-year cliff and you only worked for the company for 11 months, you would not get anything, since you havenβt vested in any part of your award. Similarly, if the company is sold within a year of your arrival, depending on what your paperwork says, you may receive nothing on the sale of the company.
A very common vesting schedule is vesting over 4 years, with a 1 year cliff. This means you get 0% vesting for the first 12 months, 25% vesting at the 12th month, and 1/48th (2.08%) more vesting each month until the 48th month. If you leave just before a year is up, you get nothing, but if you leave after 3 years, you get 75%.
βDefinitionβ In some cases, vesting may be triggered by specific events outside of the vesting schedule, according to contractual terms called accelerated vesting (or acceleration). Two kinds of accelerated vesting that are commonly negotiated are if the company is sold or undergoes a merger (single trigger) or if itβs sold and the person is fired (double trigger).
βcontroversyβ Cliffs are an important topic. When they work well, cliffs are an effective and reasonably fair system to both employees and companies. But they can be abused and their complexity can lead to misunderstandings:
The intention of a cliff is to make sure new hires are committed to staying with the company for a significant period of time. However, the flip side of vesting with cliffs is that if an employee is leavingβquits or is laid off or firedβjust short of their cliff, they may walk away with no stock ownership at all, sometimes through no fault of their own, as in the event of a family emergency or illness. In situations where companies fire or lay off employees just before a cliff, it can easily lead to hard feelings and even lawsuits (especially if the company is doing well enough that the stock is worth a lot of money).**
βimportantβ As a manager or founder, if an employee is performing poorly or may have to be laid off, itβs both thoughtful and wise to let them know whatβs going on well before their cliff.
βtechnicalβ Founders often have vesting on their stock themselves. As entrepreneur Dan Shapiro explains, this is often for good reason.
βimportantβ As an employee, if youβre leaving or considering leaving a company before your vesting cliff is met, consider waiting. Or, if your value to the company is high enough, you might negotiate to get some of your stock βvested upβ early. Your manager may well agree that is is fair for someone who has added a lot of value to the company to own stock even if they leave earlier than expected, especially for something like a family emergency. These kinds of vesting accelerations are entirely discretionary, however, unless you negotiated for special acceleration in an employment agreement. Such special acceleration rights are typically reserved for executives who negotiate their employment offers heavily.
Acceleration when a company is sold (called change of control terms) is common for founders and not so common for employees. Itβs worth understanding acceleration and triggers in case they show up in your option agreement, but these may not be something you can negotiate unless you are going to be in a key role.
Companies may impose additional restrictions on stock that is vested. For example, your shares are very likely subject to a right of first refusal, which means that you canβt sell the stock without offering it first to the company. And it can happen that companies reserve the right to repurchase vested shares in certain events.
βDefinitionβ The exercise window (or exercise period) is the period during which a person can buy shares at the strike price. Options are only exercisable for a fixed period of time, until they expire, typically seven to ten years as long as the person is working for the company. But this window is not always open.
βdangerβ Expiration after termination. Options can expire after you quit working for the company. Often, the expiration is 90 days after termination of service, making the options effectively worthless if you cannot exercise before that point. As weβll get into later, you need to understand the costs, taxes, and tax liabilities of exercise and to plan ahead. In fact, you can find out when you are granted the options, or better yet, before you sign an offer letter.
βimportantβ Longer exercise windows. Recently (since around 2015) a few companies are finding ways to keep the exercise window open for years after leaving a company, promoting this practice as fairer to employees. Companies with extended exercise windows include Amplitude,* Clef,* Coinbase,* Pinterest,* and Quora.* However, the 90-day exercise window remains the norm.