Startup Experience + Employment at Will
Pros
In early 2014, I was looking for exciting startup opportunities in San Francisco. Given my experience in leading account management teams for SaaS marketing companies, I was brought on as the 5th employee at Talkable. As a Campaign Manager, my responsibilities were to scope and execute referral campaigns for a newly signed enterprise customer and to identify and define continued success for existing customers. The startupy and autonomous environment let me make an impact on the company directly. From leading the effort to create a customer facing dashboard to display campaign performance to hiring a team of customer success managers, my efforts helped grow the company from 15 paying customers to nearly 50. The company as experiencing amazing growth and the times were exciting! Management noticed my efforts and gave me a stock refresher and a promotion on my one-year anniversary.
Cons
Shortly after, we hired a Directory of Marketing who evolved into the Director of Revenue. His efforts in marketing and lead generation paired well with my efforts in customer success. As my manager, the Director of Revenue would have regular meetings with me. During our meetings he would give me feedback that I was doing great and was a “rockstar.” On a Monday morning, two weeks before I’d vest my refresher shares, my manager and the president of the company pulled me into a conference room. After we sat down, the first thing my manager (who just commended me for my work a week ago), told me today would be my last day at work. Confused, I asked why: “The reason we’re going to give you is no reason.” “Is it performance?” “No. The reason we’re going to give you is no reason. You can either resign today, and take two weeks pay, or we’ll figure out a way to fire you.” I continued to press them for more information, but the only things they repeated were, “The reason we’re going to give you is no reason,” and “Employment in California is at-will and we can terminate it at any time without reason.” I had two weeks left before my cliff.