Hi All,
I've been working on a startup in the healthcare IT space for about 8-9 months. I started initially as a contracted developer, but over the last 2 months I was transitioned to be employee #1, on the payroll.
I was given a small portion of equity in the company (1.5%, plus an addtl 1.5% over the next 3 quarters, half of which should be vested by now), and I'm being paid a pretty nice salary for the work that I'm doing.
The thing is that based on the paper work that I signed I've been given the title of "VP in charge of technology development" when I feel like I have more of a CTO/Technical Co-founder role. I feel like upon launch if this service becomes successful that someone else will be hired for that position and will be given more of a stake in the company that I currently hold, even though I've been doing all the work in developing the product/platform from scratch.
Is this standard operating procedure? I know titles right now are irrelevant since we haven't yet launched publicly or even in a limited beta, but I want to make sure I don't get screwed out of a position that I feel I deserve. What is a standard stake of equity for employee #1 who happens to be the technical developer creating the product/service? I'm kind of naive when it comes to money and equity since I'm only 23 and this is my first startup, so I kind of just agreed with whatever was given, because up until now I had no past startup experience so I wasn't sure what to expect and figured anything was better than nothing.
Also to mention that we haven't yet raised any outside VC funding, it's all self-funded by the co-founders right now, but one of the co-founders has connections with VCs from his past job
There is no way to secure a major role after funding. I have a couple friends who "wrote it into the contract" and in one situation the VC just brought in "an assistant director" that was paid three times what he was.
Sounds like you are getting a good deal, but I would be upfront about your desire for a future role.