Hiring and retaining talent is hard. Be better

The only Excel model to structure an incentive structure to attract, promote, and retain your most valuable asset. Your team

Competiton for talent is frankly insane. If you can find them, their options are how they get rich so they need to be motivated
Most founders just tell lawyers "give me what is normal". How is that good enough given staff are your startup?
As one founder said "how the heck do founders plan their staff plan without this tool?"
This is the only ESOP planner in Excel in the world (That's literally the only reason I made it)

Setup and manage your ESOP structure for employee options

Create best in class structure to attract and retain your team through equity participation

Employee option management
An Employee Share Option Plan is how you grant options to your staff and how they vest over time. A more structured plan enables you to communicate a consistent and fair plan your staff can understand and not quibble about. This is the only Excel model which will heolp you set up and run your plan. You will tie this to your cap table and use it to build a hiring plan to negotiate when raising from investors.
Massive and complete
61,947 formulas across 14 sheets to do all the math for you
Heavy lifting done for you
You only need to input your assumptions into the yellow boxes and use the drop down menus. The model is fully integrated across sheets so choose your adventure and my math gives you accurate results
For those that want to impress
Negotiating with investors just got a lot easier. You have the tool to plan exactly what you want to do with your ESOP pool and how large you need to make it. You also have the ability to proactively excite staff to show them what their options are worth now and in the future
This is NOT for wannabees
Anyone can learn to use this tool. It is designed for pro founders though that understand the value of staff equity and want to take it seriously this time. You can do what you didn't know you could do easily now
It is 100% worth every cent
2 reasons: 1/ you couldn't even hire someone to make this, 2/ it's not a model- it's a structured learning process. You need to use it to understand what I'm saying

5 year ESOP model to calculate what options to be giving to your employees. I apply a very structured and ‘fair’ plan you can communicate to your staff so they know exactly how you work, and that no one is getting a special deal. This is the only ESOP model on the internet. If you use Carta or similar platform, their ESOP management is rubbish. Use this model to manage your plan and you can input the numbers into Carta. I know because my clients tell me this is what they do.

There are a lot of cool features under the hood

An insightful and useful model needs to work for you, not against you.

My models do require thought on inputs, but I walk you step by step with everything you need to do to support you to derive all the outputs that you need without any coding.

Enage your team by showing them the value of their options

Visualise with staff how much their options will be worth depending on the exit you achieve together

Clarify what success will mean to them
Show the $ value of their vested, and unvested options
Pull up each staff with a drop-down menu
Visualise how much money employees can make

Plan the size of the ESOP you need to make for each round

Create just the plan you need for the stage you are at.

Compare what investors are asking for against the size of your current ESOP
Plan your ESOP over 5 years and see the potential impact
Build your hiring plan to negotiate with VCs so you avoid unnecessary dilution

Create a structured ESOP in simple steps

Follow steps to create a program based on VC best practice

Create a professional program without much thought
Market assumptions pre-selected for you to use (if you don't know better)

Run scenarios to see the potential impact of funding rounds on dilution

See the how potential rounds could impact you.

Quickly input 6 years of funding rounds to plan your future
Do both priced and convertible rounds
Time based math enables you to understand exact situation

Maintain staff in one sheet and the model populates automatically across sheets

Model is structured to be simple to use and maintain with conditional formatting built in.

Maintain current and terminated employees
Set up starting grants to all staff
Track up to 150 staff

Track ESOP year on year for 5 years

The model is designed to be easy to understand and be as consistent as possible to avoid mistakes.

Each year has one sheet for annual planning
Consistent structure to understand and track your structure
Easily understand who was awarded what kind of grant

Grant performance and retention schemes with drop down menus

I've modeled this to be ridiculously simple to use once you understand the foundational concepts.

Grant promotion, performance, and evergreen incentives annually
Drop down No to Yes and the math for your scheme is automatically applied
Salary changes can be input and all the math is applied as needed

Heavy lifting done for you

The model was a lot of work! But I've tried to hide as many formulas as possible to not overwhelm you to leave you to only see outputs and inputs.

61,947 formulas do all the calculations for you
Just fill in assumption boxes and review the outcomes
Completely open model, you can check all the formulas

Excel

Unlocked

Integrated

Excel financial model
Built for PC and Mac
Not for Google Sheets

Entire model is editable by you
Nothing is locked or restricted

Fully integrated model
Each sheet acts as a module connected to each other which update immediately

Updates

No modeling needed

Easy to maintain

Model is updated with new features
I'll email you updates when they're done

Everything works out of the box
Just input your assumptions

Designed to be easy to as you need
Add new hires, update annual plans

Support

Make Plans

Scenarios

If you're really stuck, ping me an email or catch me if I'm online and I'll help you figure out what to do for free
You can hire me per hour if you need a lot of help on whatever it is you need

Develop a hiring plan and see how many options you need to create and what is left to issue to existing and new hires

Run scenarios to see the potential impact of funding rounds on dilution

FOR ALL TYPES OF STARTUPS

Model designed to work with literally any company that offers options to staff

"Equity ownership is not only important for aligning incentives between founders and investors, but crucially it drives alignment across the entire organization."

Luciana Lixandru, Sequoia Partner

It's worth the price to have one thing in your life that is absolutely perfect.

2 pricing options

Get a filled in model or the filled in model + a blank version of the file.

Filled in model

Filled in + blank

The base model has been populated with numbers so you can see how it works
You can edit it however you want

This version comes with 2 Excel files
In addition there is a blank version of the file with no assumptions in it to save you time

€399

€449

Quick walkthrough

Here's me explaining the video fairly briefly and pretending to enjoy it

The step by step ESOP template guide

To make it easy to use this model, I mapped out how to use the ESOP example step by step in this presentation. You’ll have your kick ass ESOP plan up and running in no time!

50Folds ESOP Template v3

Free training video

This is a detailed guide on how to use and fill in the ESOP model

Who the heck is hawking me a financial model!?

Hey! It's me Alexander Jarvis. I like Excel and I love solving hard things.

I'm the #1 seller of startup financial models in the world
Worked in M&A (Lazard financial institutions group)
I intimately know startup and what VCs care about having done both for over 10 years
TEDx, Top Quora Writer, accelerator mentor, fund advisor etc
I don't like bragging, so just read my blog and download free tools to see if I know what I'm talking about

Have an ESOP model that will command strength to your investors

Investors ask for larger ESOP pools than are needed so they can dilute you, it is called the Option Pool Shuffle. If you have a logical hiring plan that is defensible you can back whatever you propose and it gets hard for investors to argue with you. This model will enable you to do that and potentially save millions in valuations.

Create and manage a structed retention scheme for your team

The ESOP model is designed for you to start and maintain your ESOP structure for 5 years. Already have one? That's fine, you can move to this tool and benefit from all the functionality

Understand how to build a best practice ESOP

Asking your lawyer to just give you something, or doing what your investors say blindly is a terrible idea. Your staff are your most valuable asset. My model and guide will walk you step by step to understand how to build an ESOP to attract and retain top talent

Understand how to implement best practice for your portfolio companies

You've invested a lot of money into your startups. Their success is going to be based on attracting and retaining top talent and their option package is a key aspect of their remuneration. The ESOP model will help you to understand how to structure a plan and support them with their hiring plans.

Fundraise

Operate

Learn

Invest

PROJECTS

Complete

Defensible

Structured

Integrated

Everything that you would reasonably need in an ESOP has been considered and built for.

Multiple options have been coded so you can build a bespoke structure to your individual need.

Easily change vesting schedules and cliffs, provide multiple retention schemes through drop-downs.

Complete

Defensible

Structured

Integrated

Regardless of whether you are a CFO reporting to the CEO, a founder raising from investors, or even managing your team, you will need to defend your model to someone.

The entire model is build on intelligent logic pertinent to the ideals or attracting and retaining staff. It will be hard to argue that the model doesn't make sense, you simple nee to ensure that your assumptions are reasonable.

Complete

Defensible

Structured

Integrated

You want a model to be as easy to understand as possible. you also want to make it easy for others to be able to audit if needed. I make that as simple as possible.

Every sheet follows a consistent format. A description, links in, summary (links out), then calculations.

Formulas are broken out across rows so they are easier to follow.

Complete

Defensible

Structured

Integrated

The entire model is integrated. If you make a change in one sheet, every dependency will update automatically.

If you decide to scale down up your assumptions, automations will scale too.

If you don't understand the structure of ESOP, the model, or logic, you will get to learn how decisions impact you.

My way of modeling is pretty amazing.

Want to know more?

Let's run through details and answer your FAQs

Details on the model

The history of this model

Many startups ago... I built my first fundraising model. I had toiled for years in M&A so knew something about modeling, but man... what I built still wasn't really useful and it distracted me from when I should have been executing, pushing sales, tracking my marketing KPIs etc. Darn.

Fast forward many years and I've learnt a thing or two. I've raised for myself and many others. But, there are still a lot of things that I didn't understand. Employee options was something that interested me. I Googled and found one PDF from some non-profit and one blog from a famous VC. I called friendly founders and VCs and no one had anything on ESOP.

Fine. Let's learn about ESOP. Over the course of 2 months, I wrote the only course in the world for founders on ESOP. But then I thought, ok, but how do you actually structure an ESOP, and again there was nothing. So it took me 3 months of agony and I made the only ESOP model in the world from first principles.

Whether you’re raising for your startup, or needing to develop an operational plan to understand how you are going to issue and manage options to your new and current staff, you need an excel model to do the math (You can't do this in Carta etc). The problem is, as I can tell you, that they’re really hard to build and I am the only person who made a public model.

You don’t have time to spend 2 months building one, you need to be executing like I wish I had. Sure, maybe you have an expensive, smart CFO, but they're still running your company, and the RoI on their time to replicate what I am doing is ignorant. And come on, they do not have a clue how to do this!

For the cost of an hour of their time (or mine), you skip months of development and get straight into inputting your actuals and forecasts. This is a no-brainer.

Resent buying a model, and feel better paying someone to build a model for you? Sure, paying someone smart to build something sort of usable can cost $10k+. You won't even get what you want.

This is the model I wish existed. I literally built it for you. I only build new things which add value to founders, not copy others.

How the ESOP financial model was built

There is so little pragmatic info about ESOP it is a joke.

I invented this model from first principals and two blogs (I read everything on the internet then, trust me).

I’ve drawn on my years of experience operating startups at early and growth stage to create something that just works. There is not a needless level of detail, nor a sparsity of assumptions to illustrate a depth of logic and insight.

Everything included has been considered as to whether it adds value and if investors will “want to know and ask”, or if it will simply aid operationally in your doing your flarking job! The structure also enables founders to change the model to fit the exact needs of their startup by just using drop down menus.

This model is literally months of 100 hour weeks.

Who this is for

Are you building the next top startup? Need to smart hiring plans to negotiate with Venture Capitalists to secure a big round (and not get screwed on terms) or just understand your operational requirement in detail for hiring planning? Do you need a detailed model to understand every key aspect of your human resource business? This is it.

This model is for all companies that underpay employees and motivate and retain them through equity ownership (which is literally every founder!!). If you issue options to staff, this model is for you.

Technical features of the ESOP model

Fully integrated and automated model: Get insights with as few assumptions as possible
Standardised structure on each sheet: Calculations and assumptions are presented as simple as possible and structured to be as easy to follow
Consistent: Consistently color-coded cells for formulas, links, and assumptions applying best practices from global, top-tier investment banks. All cells are perfectly aligned
Comments: Comments on all assumptions so you know what to input and why
No hard coding: No hardcoded numbers in any formulas
Open editing: Model is not locked, you are free to restructure as much as you like!
Clear linking: Links to each sheet are always at the top of each sheet to track and understand where assumptions come from and what sheets are driving another one

FAQ

Do the models work with Google docs?

I answer this above but I get asked a lot, so will make it clear.

I don't make toys. If you want to do "finance good', get Excel.

Google stuff is only for sharing things.

I use complex calculations and Google can't process them all.

It's not even 'if' it will work in Google, you just don't want to go there.

Just get Excel if you want to be in the big leagues and use my models. It will be so much more enjoyable.

Do the models work on Mac?

I built the first models on my MacBook Pro Retina, so I know they work.

There are no compatibility issues between PC and Mac (Other than Macros). Mac just sucks huge donkey dick if you are amateur plus level and know shortcuts (like you should!).

If you're at some SF startup with a douche tech policy requiring macs, it's OK. My models will work.

Just tell your tech team you need to do your job and give you a fricking PC. Laptops are cheap these days.

I really mean it. You can't do finance on a Mac and enjoy your job (effectively).

I hate Excel on Mac so much I'm even willing to do a call for free to make the case.

Who should use this model

The model is very detailed and powerful. There is nothing available on the internet on this level, however, it is still accessible to anyone willing to learn the foundational concepts (You just have to learn ESOP concepts, sorry). Just follow my guide and watch the videos and you will know enough. Every effort has been made to make it simple for a founder to get impressive results without having to be advanced in model structuring (We did all the hard work).

You don’t have to do ANY modeling to use this model. You just need to be able to fill in the assumptions boxes. Only if you need to restructure the model due to you having a special business model will you need to be advanced level.

The ideal user:

Building a complex or simple ESOP structure
Is comfortable with numbers and wants to have control over their model with fairly granular assumptions, to customise to meet their needs without any modeling
Is at seed to scaling stage of fundraising.
Likes to impress and enjoys a beautiful model!
Wants to show investors they applied a very vigorous, logical approach to their forecasting and operations
Wants a model that runs rings around hotshot bankers without the crazy cost

Who might find this model hard

I don’t offer returns (it's a digital good), but want to make sure you succeed; so if you are new to Excel and aren’t willing to put in some work to learn, this model might not be for you.

If you don’t know how to use a (SUM) function you may find it overwhelming if you need to understand every detail. Every line has been broken up to be logical to understand, so with a little diligence, anyone can be a total boss.
If you don’t really understand what an option is and don't want to learn, well you are screwed generally you moron
If you insist on using Google Sheets, don't use this

Why this model was built

Startup is hard and fundraising is a total nightmare. It takes up so much time and it can be far easier to execute if you have the right tools to hand.
When we started Delivery Hero I spent far too much time figuring out how to build a good fundraising and operation model and it was infuriating. I wished I had something that just worked, or a base I could use to fiddle with and get the result I wanted (Meaning, getting back to executing). We’re making these models so you don’t have the same painful, long nights and weeks, not executing like I wished I could have.
I then learned more and realised what I didn't know and that there are always new concepts to learn. ESOP was something no one explained, so I decided I would suck it up and do it.

Support

What do I need to use this model?

You need Excel. Google Sheets is never to be used for a fundraising model as the functionality is limited. It might work in Sheets, but I can't warrant it will work. I highly recommend using a PC and Excel
This works on both Mac and PC and was built on both (But Mac sucks)
You should install the ‘Solver Add-in’ and ‘Analysis TookPak’ if you do not have it installed already. These are free and standard Microsoft add-ins. I don't require it, but it's worth having
I do not have circular references so there is no need for ‘iterations’ in this model, but in case, turn them on in your calculation settings, especially if you fiddle.
This is not needed, but if you want to be a boss in Excel, download https://www.asap-utilities.com/. There are some really useful tools if you need to build models. It only works on PC though (as do the other cool tools).

Customise the model for me?

Refunds?

Who the heck built these models and do you have a clue?

Hi. You're on my site, I built the models.

I've worked at Lazard in FIG M&A (Top tier firm and team), VC, I've built lots of startups, I mentor at lots of accelerators (And mentor some of the people who run them), TEDx talked, bla bla.

I've got more free Excel tools on my site than any other startup site and I give the stuff away that others charge for. Get some of my free stuff and tell for yourself before you buy if you aren't sure.

What if there is an error?

I get really mad when people find errors- it's not me being mad at you, but mad at me. I hate errors! They make me so embarrassed.

If there is an error, I want to know! Just email me and I'll look into it and fix it for you gladly. Maybe within an hour if I'm free.

Bear in mind normally when people say there is an error they just did something wrong and didn't understand why. Let me know anyway.

Honestly, my models are normally so large it is literally impossible not to make errors occasionally, especially when you update them.

Do you send updates?

Is the model locked?

Want this model in a different currency? Now you can!

Convert all currencies in the model into one of 17 different currencies with a button mash

This model uses formatted currencies in $ (Why I use US Dollars). I often get asked if it is available in other currencies such as €? So I made an Excel PC addin to do that (It was hard!)

At the press of a button you can now convert the model into 17 different currencies. You just need to purchase the productivity addin.

Here are the currencies you can use with the macro:

Currency list	The format you will see
EUR	€
USD	$
GBP	£
YEN	¥
INR	₹
Krone	kr
BAHT	฿
RUB	₽
Peso	₱
BRL	R$
RM	RM
Rp	Rp
HKD	HK$
ILS	₪
KPW	₩
RMB	¥
CHF	CHF

Part of the productivity addin

All my favourite hacks and time saving tools in one place

More than likely, you aren't a huge Excel nerd like me, so you probably don't know about macros? These are hacks to make modeling in Excel much more faster and less painful. I love them!

I've been making models for years, so you can be sure I know what is useful and what is not. I decided to not just make the currency conversion macro, but add in all my most used hacks. You just hit a button and it will do handy things.

What can you do?

Automatically format your cells so they have 'investment banking' standard black, blue and green
Change the zoom and cell position of every sheet so it looks great when others read it
Save a backup of your model (v1, v2, v3) at the push of a button so you never get a corrupt model
Add error checks to your formulas
And a whole bunch of other nerdy things you'll understand when you are making models yourself!

NOTE:

Currency conversion only works on 50Folds models. It won't on any other model (My code looks for certain cells... There is a hack- ask if you want to know)

Productivity tool

2 pricing options

Get a filled in model or the filled in model + a blank version of the file.

Filled in model

Filled in + blank

The base model has been populated with numbers so you can see how it works
You can edit it however you want

This version comes with 2 Excel files
In addition there is a blank version of the file with no assumptions in it to save you time

€399

€449

Purchase guide and note

Let's just get clear so you know how it works and what to expect

Buying models

Getting the model

Payment and delivery of the model is 100% automated!
It's hosted on SamCart and payment is via Stripe (Secure)
There are no refunds. These are digital goods you can't return
If you have questions ask me first in the chat or via email
If you aren't sure if this is the right model for you, ask me!

After you buy you get confirmation emails from SamCart
Delivery of the model is automated
Note: I don't know why, but occasionally it can take an hour
The file comes in a zip file. You need to unzip it (e.g. WinZip)
If you're really stuck, ping me an email or via chat box!

Comments 8

Justin Clarke
October 20, 2017 at 8:22 am

Alexander, do you have a legal template for this? Lawyers are expensive and it would be helpful to get a template that a lawyer can tune?

1. Post
  Author
  
  Alexander Jarvis
  October 20, 2017 at 1:36 pm
  
  Justin – Since we are talking legal ownership, you would want to account for this in a cap table. I have one that I’ll try get done. This is for having a solid overview and for planning purposes, but I wouldn’t use it as a legal document.
  
Matias Campiani
May 8, 2018 at 7:47 pm

HI Justin, very nice and comprehensive model! Saved me weeks thank a lot!
Have a question: We closed a Series A Prefered at a valuation of $47M, share price $56. A couple month later we did a 409a and it come in at a equity value of common of $15M and a shareprice of common of $11. Which should I use? Should I exclude the preferred shares from the shares amount? What shoudl I input in Assumptions D114

1. Post
  Author
  
  Alexander Jarvis
  May 8, 2018 at 8:14 pm
  
  Hi Matias –
  Justin asked a question too…
  
  Thanks for the feedback 😉
  
  You did a raise and the valuation of the PREFERENCE shares was set at a price of $56.
  
  If you did a 409A valuation for the COMMON with the goal of setting a strike price for options, which requires the FMV of a price per share of common stock, then the price for the common shares is $11.
  
  Institutional fundraising are done through a different class of stock (PREFERENCE) with better rights.
  
  Your 409A valuation firm basically said there is a difference between the two types of classes of share to justify a lower valuation for the common (and hence the strike price of the options) than what the investors paid for the preferred.
  
  The one you care about for the strike price for your staff is therefore $11.
  
alma angela
March 18, 2019 at 2:20 pm

Hello.
I am interested in writing guest post for your blog. Are you currently accepting
guest post.
Regard’s Angela. For a guest post.

1. Post
  Author
  
  Alexander Jarvis
  May 10, 2019 at 2:48 am
  
  Alma- I haven’t allowed any guest post to date. I only will post high-value content for startups and investors and not some rubbish for backlink purposes.
  Alexander
  
Qasim Valerian
July 14, 2022 at 7:14 pm

Thanks for your post.

1. Post
  Author
  
  Alexander Jarvis
  July 17, 2022 at 12:56 pm
  
  Thanks Qasim

Hiring and retaining talent is hard. Be better

The only Excel model to structure an incentive structure to attract, promote, and retain your most valuable asset. Your team

Setup and manage your ESOP structure for employee options

Create best in class structure to attract and retain your team through equity participation

Employee option management

Massive and complete

Heavy lifting done for you

For those that want to impress

This is NOT for wannabees

It is 100% worth every cent

There are a lot of cool features under the hood

Enage your team by showing them the value of their options

Plan the size of the ESOP you need to make for each round

Create a structured ESOP in simple steps

Run scenarios to see the potential impact of funding rounds on dilution

Maintain staff in one sheet and the model populates automatically across sheets

Track ESOP year on year for 5 years

Grant performance and retention schemes with drop down menus

Heavy lifting done for you

Excel

Unlocked

Integrated

Updates

No modeling needed

Easy to maintain

Support

Make Plans

Scenarios

FOR ALL TYPES OF STARTUPS

Model designed to work with literally any company that offers options to staff

"Equity ownership is not only important for aligning incentives between founders and investors, but crucially it drives alignment across the entire organization." Luciana Lixandru, Sequoia Partner

It's worth the price to have one thing in your life that is absolutely perfect.

2 pricing options

Get a filled in model or the filled in model + a blank version of the file.

Filled in model

Filled in + blank

Quick walkthrough

Here's me explaining the video fairly briefly and pretending to enjoy it

The step by step ESOP template guide

To make it easy to use this model, I mapped out how to use the ESOP example step by step in this presentation. You’ll have your kick ass ESOP plan up and running in no time!

Free training video

This is a detailed guide on how to use and fill in the ESOP model

Who the heck is hawking me a financial model!?

Hey! It's me Alexander Jarvis. I like Excel and I love solving hard things.

Want to know more?

Let's run through details and answer your FAQs

Details on the model

FAQ

Want this model in a different currency? Now you can!

Convert all currencies in the model into one of 17 different currencies with a button mash

Part of the productivity addin

All my favourite hacks and time saving tools in one place

2 pricing options

Get a filled in model or the filled in model + a blank version of the file.

Filled in model

Filled in + blank

Purchase guide and note

Let's just get clear so you know how it works and what to expect

Buying models

Getting the model

Comments 8

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

"Equity ownership is not only important for aligning incentives between founders and investors, but crucially it drives alignment across the entire organization."

Luciana Lixandru, Sequoia Partner