Shares In My Own Startup? How To Think Through Equity

How to divide equity among cofounders and employees is a perennial question in startup world. This article builds on Startup101: How Do I Divide Equity Among My Cofounders And Employees?, expanding some ideas and introducing some new ones. 1) Core Principles i) Contributions – Give some weight to the contributions to date but the overwhelming focus should be about future contributions. ii) Ownership ≠ Control – Economic ownership is not the same thing as authority / control – it’s very possible and in fact quite a common situation for the person in charge (CEO) to not be the biggest shareholder. iii)…...