- Understanding the company's place in the market & how they make money
- Understanding their expectations for you -- have they thought them through?
and finally
- How well they respond to questions that they won't answer. They won't show you the cap table, but how the conversation goes is a good indicator of how well you and the future manager will be able to communicate.
They offer you any sort of stock as compensation, and are privately held and won't show you the cap table it is a polite thanks but no thanks and exit.
Any company that isn't comfortable sharing that information isn't going anywhere fast -- or they are about to go public (but you would know that already as well).
No need to be that drastic - just treat the compensation package as if the equity grant is worth $0. With the liquidity and uncertainty involved, you probably want to do that anyway, since you care a lot about "how far away am I from not having enough money" and an equity grant that pays off with a power distribution a decade out helps you very little on that front.
Regardless of what the cap table says you should treat that grant as a $0.
I have heard "we dont have one". A sign to run.
I have heard "we dont share that sort of info with staff". Major failure to understand the information I would be entitled to owning even a SINGLE share.
No speaks volumes about management, about its confidence, about it's openness. These are thing that one who is going to work for a company should be HYPER concerned with.
- Understanding the company's place in the market & how they make money
- Understanding their expectations for you -- have they thought them through?
and finally
- How well they respond to questions that they won't answer. They won't show you the cap table, but how the conversation goes is a good indicator of how well you and the future manager will be able to communicate.