Today I received letter from the company on our share grant which is a replacement for our ESOS that expired last year. It is slightly different from the last ESOS. For ESOS we can exercise share allocated for the ESOS in the year we received the shares. For this share grant, we can only exercise the option for shares after one year we received the grant and over a 3 years period. For instance, I can only exercise the grant from next year onward for 3 years i.e. about 33% of the allocation in one year.
There is also a mini grant allocated that we can exercise this year. The grant is given as a compensation for us to exercise one third of the option this year as the grant is supposed to be given last year and start exercising this year.
Some staff are not happy for two reasons:
1. They compared to the first ESOS and found that allocation is far too small amount this round
2. Some newly joint staff are not eligible to receive the grant
Another group is actually staff with corporate level 6 and below as they received cash and not shares.
I think the above 3 groups are not happy for the wrong reasons.
1. They should be happy as they received free shares as long term incentive again. How many company offer ESOS or share grant out there? Is that the original reason why they join this company? I think we should be grateful of what we enjoy especially if you know the average unemployment rate in US is more than 10% in many states.
In addition, they should try to find out the formula for the share allocation which is not very different from the ESOS and also with new ruling, company has to pay for share grant expenses which come into effect after the ESOS is implemented. In other words, thing has changed but we are still living in the past.
2. It is an international standard that staff who join for less than certain period will not enjoy certain type of benefits such as ESOS etc. Therefore, they should not feel unhappy as the existing staff have been working here for some time and hence they enjoy benefits from their past contribution. In addition, I don't think they are promised with the share grant before they joined not long ago as they may actually sue the company for not delivering promise in the employment letter, for instance.
The last group receiving cash have actually given opportunity to decide whether they will receive cash or share but their focus group peers have decided (about 80% agree) to receive cash. Cash or share is about rezeki. Nobody can be assure that ESOS made money as I have seen company ESOS cause employees lose money after they borrow loan to pick up the shares but the share went under water. Money in your pocket and used is your money but not shares registered in your CDS account.
All in all, we should be grateful for what we have especially it is free. Furthermore, nobody forces anybody to accept the free shares as we can always refuse. If one feels that this is not a good company or not getting the appropriate treatment, one should leave the company and look for better opportunity. One should always help himself rather than blaming others for not good treatment. Unfair treatment is everywhere and we should either do something about it or accept it. However, the least we should do is to be unhappy about something that we get for free.
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