<story><title>Ask HN: Firing an employee under a month before vest?</title><text>I&amp;#x27;m the founder of an early stage startup, around 10 employees.&lt;p&gt;One of those (one of the first to join) has been an issue for quite a while. Lots of time off, low effort at work, minimal hours. Felt like squeezing water out of a stone to get a result from them.&lt;p&gt;Recently, their behavior has gotten worse despite feedback. Taking off without informing team. Found out a lot of past work was plain wrong.&lt;p&gt;They vest in a few weeks. I don&amp;#x27;t want to have them on the team anymore, I&amp;#x27;m done trying and this employee is negatively affecting me and the company.&lt;p&gt;Should I let them vest then let them go, or just let them go? Feedback from former founders esp is helpful. Any downsides to having them on the cap table?</text></story><parent_chain><item><author>supernova87a</author><text>If you can&amp;#x27;t fire an employee because the vesting of their shares is &amp;quot;part of their compensation&amp;quot;, what&amp;#x27;s the point of vesting at all?   You should just give it to them on day 1, right?   How is an executive supposed to operate if something that was promised for the fulfillment of service &lt;i&gt;through a certain day&lt;/i&gt; becomes an entitlement any time before that agreed date?   One month is too &amp;quot;obvious&amp;quot;?  How about 2 months?  6 months?   Where is the line when it&amp;#x27;s ok to fire someone before their vesting day but not after?</text></item><item><author>dredmorbius</author><text>Vesting is part of compensation.  Denying part of compensation after the fact is bad look.  Keep in mind that they&amp;#x27;re options, and unless exercised, and there&amp;#x27;s a liquidity event, both of which are highly uncertain, it&amp;#x27;s all funny money.&lt;p&gt;If you terminate shortly before vesting:&lt;p&gt;1. You face the prospect of an expensive and distracting wrongful termination suit.&lt;p&gt;2. You&amp;#x27;re sending a &lt;i&gt;blindingly&lt;/i&gt; obvious signal to all &lt;i&gt;other&lt;/i&gt; employees, and potential employees, that you can, will, &lt;i&gt;and have&lt;/i&gt; terminated employees immediately before vesting.  That may well prove ruinous if you find yourself unable to hire and&amp;#x2F;or retain talent.&lt;p&gt;Let the vest happen.  Whether you separate from the employee before or after is your call, though if you&amp;#x27;ve made that determination, do so.&lt;p&gt;PIPs are fugly as hell for all involved but exist for a reason.  You should probably look into setting that up as a process.&lt;p&gt;Fix your recruitment, training, and monitoring processes.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>TideAd</author><text>I mean the answer is that you just feel it out. 1 month is soon enough to wait, 2 months is gray area, 3 months is probably fine. And if it&amp;#x27;s a huge vest, then you give more leeway.&lt;p&gt;You&amp;#x27;re not appealing to some objective rule here. You&amp;#x27;re thinking about what would look like shitty behavior to the rest of your employees.&lt;p&gt;Firing people gracefully is a really, really important part your relationship to your employees. It&amp;#x27;s about whether people feel like they&amp;#x27;re being respected as professionals or abused like they work in a sweatshop.</text></comment>
<story><title>Ask HN: Firing an employee under a month before vest?</title><text>I&amp;#x27;m the founder of an early stage startup, around 10 employees.&lt;p&gt;One of those (one of the first to join) has been an issue for quite a while. Lots of time off, low effort at work, minimal hours. Felt like squeezing water out of a stone to get a result from them.&lt;p&gt;Recently, their behavior has gotten worse despite feedback. Taking off without informing team. Found out a lot of past work was plain wrong.&lt;p&gt;They vest in a few weeks. I don&amp;#x27;t want to have them on the team anymore, I&amp;#x27;m done trying and this employee is negatively affecting me and the company.&lt;p&gt;Should I let them vest then let them go, or just let them go? Feedback from former founders esp is helpful. Any downsides to having them on the cap table?</text></story><parent_chain><item><author>supernova87a</author><text>If you can&amp;#x27;t fire an employee because the vesting of their shares is &amp;quot;part of their compensation&amp;quot;, what&amp;#x27;s the point of vesting at all?   You should just give it to them on day 1, right?   How is an executive supposed to operate if something that was promised for the fulfillment of service &lt;i&gt;through a certain day&lt;/i&gt; becomes an entitlement any time before that agreed date?   One month is too &amp;quot;obvious&amp;quot;?  How about 2 months?  6 months?   Where is the line when it&amp;#x27;s ok to fire someone before their vesting day but not after?</text></item><item><author>dredmorbius</author><text>Vesting is part of compensation.  Denying part of compensation after the fact is bad look.  Keep in mind that they&amp;#x27;re options, and unless exercised, and there&amp;#x27;s a liquidity event, both of which are highly uncertain, it&amp;#x27;s all funny money.&lt;p&gt;If you terminate shortly before vesting:&lt;p&gt;1. You face the prospect of an expensive and distracting wrongful termination suit.&lt;p&gt;2. You&amp;#x27;re sending a &lt;i&gt;blindingly&lt;/i&gt; obvious signal to all &lt;i&gt;other&lt;/i&gt; employees, and potential employees, that you can, will, &lt;i&gt;and have&lt;/i&gt; terminated employees immediately before vesting.  That may well prove ruinous if you find yourself unable to hire and&amp;#x2F;or retain talent.&lt;p&gt;Let the vest happen.  Whether you separate from the employee before or after is your call, though if you&amp;#x27;ve made that determination, do so.&lt;p&gt;PIPs are fugly as hell for all involved but exist for a reason.  You should probably look into setting that up as a process.&lt;p&gt;Fix your recruitment, training, and monitoring processes.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>GavinMcG</author><text>This is a great example of a line-drawing fallacy. The claim isn&amp;#x27;t wrong just because there&amp;#x27;s no universal precise line.</text></comment>