I think its less about more risk etc, and its more like, they are the ones starting the company lol.
1. They are providing jobs
2. They are responsible for growing business
3. They are accountable to not only the employees but to board and investors, etc.
They take money off the table because they are in a much different position than say an engineer. It might be bad to say, but the engineer is responsible for one part of the business, the founders and CEO etc are responsible for all aspects of the business, and should be compensated appropriately for it, whether secondaries or higher salaries etc.
Also, secondaries at seed and A are not as common as they were during the 2020-2022 run up.
Are founding engineers not also taking on risk? They're typically taking a much lower salary in exchange for their shares. They're avoiding vacations, nice cars, fancy houses, and other expenses that they could purchase if they worked for a larger, public company. In the example from the article WeWork founding engineers would've gone 9 years without seeing any value from their shares while the CEO was cashing out billions.
The difference in responsibilities is already accounted for in their disparate salaries and ownership stakes. I don't think it's very relevant to whether or not they should have the option of cashing out some of their stake during funding rounds.
1. They are providing jobs 2. They are responsible for growing business 3. They are accountable to not only the employees but to board and investors, etc.
They take money off the table because they are in a much different position than say an engineer. It might be bad to say, but the engineer is responsible for one part of the business, the founders and CEO etc are responsible for all aspects of the business, and should be compensated appropriately for it, whether secondaries or higher salaries etc.
Also, secondaries at seed and A are not as common as they were during the 2020-2022 run up.