In the dynamic landscape of boutique professional service firms, the prospect of equity ownership often entices employees to envision themselves as stakeholders in the firm’s success.
Starting a boutique professional service firm is an exciting journey. Here, we’ve distilled our collective experiences into eight key questions every founder team should ask and answer when structuring ownership:
What is dead equity? Dead equity is equity held by people who no longer work for the firm.
Mike Braun started Pivotal Advisors with his brother to get off an airplane and make a living with less stress. One day he realized he wanted more than a lifestyle business. This required the recruitment of the next generation of leaders who wanted a piece of the pie. Mike masterfully created a plan to allow for equity to be shared with the new team. And in the process, he built a legacy, a firm that would last long after he and his brother were gone.
Equity splits can end up being multimillion-dollar decisions. So how do you decide if you’re going to give employees equity, and how much equity to give them?
There are many ways to split up a partnership. And the equity split needs to evolve over time. On this episode, Kelsey Raymond, Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer at Influence & Co., shares how she successfully replicated herself by developing a key employee into her COO, so she can run the business on her own terms.
