Zynga: “Hey, we were kidding about those stock options.”
Justin Scheck and Shayndi Raice, writing in the WSJ:
Zynga Inc. Chief Executive Mark Pincus often gave shares rather than high salaries to his top talent as he built his online-game start-up. But as Zynga grew into a multibillion-dollar company, Mr. Pincus appears to have developed giver’s remorse. Early last year, as Mr. Pincus began preparing to take Zynga public, he and several other executives decided the company had doled out too many stock rights to certain people in its early days. The executives chose an unusual solution: They began demanding that certain employees surrender some shares or be fired.
As part of my ongoing attempts this year to blow off valuable job contacts until I eventually end up working behind a cash register somewhere, I’ve ignored two or three nibbles from Zynga. Unlike a few of the other contacts I’ve failed to follow up on, I have absolutely no regrets about ignoring these people, and increasingly less regret about ignoring any startup which proudly mentions an association with them (three or four I’ve run across have). If you’ve learned how to run your business the Zynga way, I don’t want to do business with you.
