Mary Russell counsels individual employees and founders to negotiate, maximize and monetize their stock options and other startup stock. She is an attorney and the founder of Stock Option Counsel.

A: Startup would not likely offer accelerated vesting upon change of control without you asking for it. But acceleration is usually a negotiable term for anyone in mid to senior roles.

If you frame this negotiation as a discussion of your role and what you are being brought on to accomplish, it will get to the truth of the matter - What vesting makes sense for your position in the enterprise's future? All compensation - and especially vesting schedules - should make sense for what you are there to do. But startups might not take the time to look at it in that way.

For example, a senior engineer was brought into a Series A startup to make a big push toward efficient operations. He was so successful at his job that the startup was "finished" with him after 6 months when the operations could be managed by junior engineers. He was on a four year vesting schedule with a one year cliff. Did it make sense that he would receive zero equity for doing an amazing job at exactly the job he was hired to do? No.

If the comapny wont agree to acceleration, ask for more shares to make up for the fact that you don't expect to earn the full number of shares in your grant.

Good luck. And watch out for the precise terms of your acceleration language to be sure they make sense as well.

Mary Russell counsels individual employees and founders to negotiate, maximize and monetize their stock options and other startup stock. She is an attorney and the founder of Stock Option Counsel.